


Waking Ghosts

by SnakeFeathers



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Winter Soldier (Comics)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Spoilers, Comic Spoilers, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Platonic Relationships, Platonic Soulmates, Post-Movie(s), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Bucky Barnes, Protective Steve Rogers, Recovery, Suspense, in which recovery is long and dangerous and HYDRA complicates everything
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-23
Updated: 2014-10-11
Packaged: 2018-01-20 13:15:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1511861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnakeFeathers/pseuds/SnakeFeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Images, sounds, faces that weren't quite familiar yet impossible to forget were starting to surface. HYDRA and SHIELD had both fallen, entangled in each other's webs, leaving victims on both sides. The Winter Soldier had been abandoned, alone and confused and aching so much. Ghosts from the Winter Soldier's-- from Bucky's-- past were awakening. With nowhere to go, no one to report to, there is only one person he can seek out for answers- the man from the bridge with his bright eyes and gentle voice. The man he was supposed to kill.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Past Phantoms

**Author's Note:**

> First time writing for Marvel, but I hope you guys enjoy it! This first chapter is a recap of events, and lead into the plot. Pairings aren't entirely explicit, but I'm not saying there aren't /any/ ships in here. This is likely going to be a long fic and deal with Bucky's recovery and the future of the Avengers. I hope you guys like it! You can prod me at tumblr too if you want updates on how the fic is coming along! (url: snakefeathers)

_“I’m with you to the end of the line.”_

The words rang in the soldier’s head, clouding his thoughts, replaying over and over and over. The steel girders creaked and groaned, jolting violently with a great shuddering sigh of fatigued metal as the Insight Helicarrier lost its integrity. He scarcely felt it, eyes fixed on the water below, where his mission had fallen. Anchored to the structure, unable to bring himself move, he for the first time felt something so foreign it faltered his concentration. It was an emotion so strange, so unfamiliar, that he couldn’t even put a name to it.

“… I’m with you to the end of the line.” the words more or less tumbled out in response, a flat mimicry that left a bitter taste in his mouth. He both knew and didn’t know that sentence. Familiar and foreign, yet powerful nonetheless. The disintegrating Helicarrier was hardly acknowledged, an odd internal war drowning it out. The asset had been presented a choice. For as long as his fractured memory could span, he had only been told what to do, fed orders and commands with no room for thought. This was new, this was unexpected, and it was terrifyingly unfamiliar.

Seconds ticked by, although they might as well have been hours. Differing options and a hundred different scenarios whirled through his mind. One, however, stuck. _Jump down, get him_. Just why that option was voiced so strongly in his mind was a mystery, but it wasn’t rooted in HYDRA’s tampering. His mission had been completed, his target eliminated, he was to report back, but he realized he had a choice. He could make his own choice. He didn’t have to listen. He didn’t _have_ to report back. There was a slight twitch in the corner of his mouth as bits of programming were violently shrugged off, grasping at the realization he could chose his actions for himself. The choice was made. He released his hold on the twisted spire of metal, falling silently and quickly to the turbulent water.

The impact didn’t stun him, but the sudden envelopment of the cold waters did. The suffocating darkness, the disorientation of the churning currents, the sinister, icy embrace of the river, it triggered something in him that transcended all the programming and reinforcing to his mind. Fragments of memories, broken images and muffled voices filled his mind, but it was too eroded to make anything clear. _Reaching towards an outstretched hand, biting wind, a frantic scream, falling, falling endlessly… then cold, choking, swirling darkness_. The sudden rush of corrupted memories and haunting familiarity startled him, his lungs almost losing their grip on his precious oxygen as he jolted out of his daze. The water around him might not as been as cold as in that broken memory, but it was cold enough to trigger a strange sort of primordial fear in him that the soldier didn’t even realize he had.

It all happened in the span of a moment, and still recovering from the jarring, intrusive memories he swam downwards, deeper and deeper, down towards the bottom. The water was fetid, choked with oil and fuel and blood, burning his eyes and wounds as he descended. His shoulder buckled with every forced movement, the dislocated joint crackling in pain and protesting every action. He scarcely cared, so focused that the pain was merely a faint recollection in the back of his mind. The pressure in his ears, the searing ache in his lungs, they were instantly forgotten when he caught a flash of a blue uniform through blurred vision. There was only one thing that could be.

Metal fingers blindly grasped at the murk, a panicked desperation growing inside him as his head swam from his rapidly depleting oxygen. _I should have taken a deeper breath_. He silently cursed the lack of sensation in his artificial limb; his other arm was too injured to be of any use anymore, now so painful from the strenuous movement that he could barely swim. There was another fleeting glimpse of blue, and the soldier made a quick grab for it, his palm roughly contacting something solid with a _thunk_. No time. There was no time to make sure. The cold of the waters was sinking into his bones, the strength bleeding from his already exhausted muscles as his oxygen diminished with panic setting in. Panic in and of itself was an alien sensation, something he hadn’t experienced but on scant few occasions.

He was _scared_. He was scared for himself. He was scared for the other man for reasons that eluded his confused mind. The battered soldier subconsciously tightened his grip, struggling to swim back to the surface, the added weight and his now all-but-useless arm slowing him down dangerously. His lungs retched, desperate for fresh oxygen. If he was ailing this badly then the other man surely had already drowned. For some reason, that thought filled him with a heavy dread he had not yet experienced. Why did he even feel this way? 

The surface flickered seemingly just out of reach, a cruel taunting goal so tantalizingly close yet seemingly lifetimes away. Bubbles escaped his mouth as he pushed himself as hard as he could those last precious seconds, and he finally broke the surface. Gasping raggedly after coughing up a mouthful of tainted water he pulled the other man to the surface, taking an unexpected (for him at least) amount of care not to accidentally injure him further, sparing him a glance once he was sure he wouldn’t sink under the water from exhaustion. He didn’t like what he saw. His skin was pale and there was no rapid, thankful inhale of oxygen, just an unsettling stillness and silence. For some reason it bothered him. It bothered him a _lot_.

There was a brief moment where he felt words building in his throat. A name perhaps, he couldn’t be sure; the words left his mind as quickly as they appeared. Treading water while holding the man up by his upper arm so his head remained above the water, the Soviet tried to collect himself, tried to work out just what he was going to do next. Why had he even done this? He was supposed to kill this man, so why the hell had he jumped into the Potomac and nearly drowned himself trying to save him? That statement of his, before the collapse, it’d sparked something in him. Memories, an emotion; it’d done _something_ and he wanted to know what. That had to be why he’d done this, why he’d chosen, for the first time, to risk his life over another person.

A weak cough sounding far too pitiful for someone of the man’s stature escaped his target, a dribble of bloody water leaking from his mouth. It was the first sign of life the man had shown, so at least now it was obvious he still clung to life; it filled him with an unexpected, and unwelcome, sense of relief. His target looked oddly delicate, small even, bloodied and bruised by the assassin’s own hands. For some reason, it bothered him; he looked familiar, so painfully familiar. Flashes and pieces of memories slogged through programming, images trickling into his mind of a scrawny boy covered in bruises and cuts with warm eyes and a lopsided smile. _I had him on the ropes, Bucky. Like hell you did, Steve._ The conversation was entirely unknown to him, yet there it was within his own mind. _Bucky_. The man had called him that. The boy in the memory had the same face, the same voice as the man, yet he was also different, with his thin frame and scrappy clothes and bony limbs. Talked with a loving familiarity toward the one known as Bucky, looking up with him with a gentle, appreciative gaze. It was confusing and the soldier was irritated at his inability to understand what any of this meant. Maybe once he regained consciousness this man could tell him just what these broken memories, if they even were memories, meant.

It hurt like all hell, but with no other options he had to swim with his injured arm; he couldn’t keep treading water much longer, and he knew that any remaining SHIELD agents would be searching the waters soon. Abandoning the grip on his arm, he knotted one of the uniform straps into his metal fingers, giving him a more secure grip. He didn’t dare let go of the man for even a moment now that he was swimming, knowing that if he slipped below the surface he wouldn’t have the strength to get him again. The sound of helicopters and aircraft congregating around the doomed Helicarrier made him swim faster; for all his skills and experience, in his current condition, he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to escape or fight off a large enough group. Now that he had the man at the surface and wasn’t as overcome with fragments of memory, the pain was starting to creep into his awareness. He wanted to stop, to catch his breath and rest, but he knew if he did the both of them would likely drown, or worse, he’d be captured.

 _Keep moving, don’t stop_. The swim to shore was as difficult as the dive, possibly even more so. The sharp pain in his arm had turned into a hot ache; the grinding in his joint had gotten worse, and the possibility of a fracture was now very real. The other man’s unconsciousness was a blessing in disguise; he couldn’t thrash or pull away from him like this; he would be very tempted to let him drown if he tried to put up a fight right now. The earlier confusion and disorientation was slowly turning into pained irritation. Before this everything had made sense. Nothing had been confusing or complicated; he was awoken, fed orders, maintained, deployed, and then put back to sleep to start the process over. There were no memories to haunt him, no guilt or remorse, so why, _why now_ were these broken semblances of humanity appearing in his mind?

The water soon was shallow enough to stand, the Soviet letting out a soft exhale that could have passed as relief as he was able to plant his legs beneath him and stand. His injured arm was gingerly held close to his chest, every slight movement sending a jolt of pain through him. For the first time he felt the pounding ache in his leg, where he’d been pinned under the girders. He hadn’t really noticed before if he’d been injured, having been far too focused on killing his target. This would complicate his escape. His grip on his target’s uniform strap never wavered, pulling him ashore as he was too tired, too hurt to pick him up. _He’s heavier than I remember_. He wasn’t sure why he remembered him being lighter; he was sure he hadn’t seen him before. Or, he thought he hadn’t. There was a brief moment where he missed the simplicity of HYDRA, where these painful and confusing thoughts were absent from his mind, but it was dismissed a mere second later. Despite this confusion and the pain ringing between his ears as his brain tried to make sense of everything, he somehow knew this was better than anything HYDRA had done to him.

Rather unceremoniously, the soldier dropped his target onto the bank, far enough out of the reach of the water to be safe from drowning. Gentleness was still an alien concept. The corner of the man’s mouth twitched slightly, a gurgling cough of river water his only reply to the jarring placement. The buzz of helicopters and aircraft hummed in the Soviet’s ears; he needed to escape, to hide himself, to figure out what to do next. The urge to run built in his chest, but he ignored it for a few precious seconds. Weary eyes scanned the unconscious man, making a mental tally of his ‘handiwork’. The bullet wounds were oozing blood; the one to the man’s abdomen had gone clean through, and he dimly acknowledged the internal damage he must have suffered. There was a fleeting sensation of disappointment. _Relatively immobile, very close range, no wind; pitiful work, it should have taken one bullet_. Innumerable scrapes, cuts, bruises and lacerations, doubtless internal bleeding, broken bones likely; despite all of the injuries he’d still refused to fight him. It was so confounding to the soldier that he had no idea how he should respond to that information.

The pain in his leg was demanding his attention, building from a dull ache to a hot, pulsing agony. Fractured, perhaps, but he would deal with that later. His keepers would—his keepers were gone. A flickering moment of panic settled into his mind. _Where do I go?_ He could treat his injuries, he’d done it more times than he could remember, but what came after was a frightening mystery. He felt like he needed to report back, to report to someone. He had never been truly on his own before, always tethered with an invisible leash to his HYDRA keepers. Now that link was severed, and he was alone.

It was difficult to walk away. The Soviet wasn’t sure why, but it was. The need to escape, to hide himself away and lick his wounds clean and recoup, however, was stronger than whatever fleeting emotion wanted him to stay at the man’s side. And so he walked. He walked, and walked, ducking between SHIELD agents scattered by the day’s events, around law enforcement and military, avoiding any human being he came across. He needed someplace quiet, someplace dark and safe, where he could heal and fashion some sort of plan. Within moments, he was gone, a ghost slipping from reality as easily as a mirage, leaving hardly a trace of where he had headed. 

He didn’t spare the man he’d risked his life to pull from the river a backwards glance.


	2. New Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And here is where the plot begins. Things are just going to heat up from here on out.

As soon as he’d been released from the hospital, as soon as he could walk more than ten feet without something hurting and Sam saying “you might be Captain America but you’re not as bulletproof as the American dream so lie down before you hurt yourself”, Steve was out and looking for Bucky. He needed to find him. He had to find him. The fall of SHIELD had taken its toll on everyone. Natasha had so many political fires to put out, Fury was rooting out HYDRA remains, many of the SHIELD agents had filtered into other branches of the government, and what of him?

The _great_ Captain America?

Without SHIELD barking missions at him, and in between his fruitless searches for the soldier, he didn’t do anything. He stayed out of his apartment, hunting and looking for as long as he could. The fact that he had had a hand in the Insight disaster ate away as his peace. Sleep eluded him often, plagued by nightmares of the destruction almost wrought on the world, of HYDRA’s atrocities, and Bucky. Those were the worst. He’d seen the chair, the cryotube, he’d seen it all when the agents tracked the location down. Just the sight of it had raised bile in his throat. _This never should have happened to you, Buck_. The decades he had spent dreamlessly frozen in the remains of that plane were nothing compared to the horrors his friend must have endured. The guilt sat heavy in his soul like a weight of lead.

His injuries had healed, leaving little else but faint silvery scars where the bullets and metal hand had bitten into him. The serum’s boost to his immune system had saved him from an infection from the contaminated water, and mended the injuries quickly enough. With Natasha gone, Sam had kept an eye on the apartment while he was recovering, picking up the pieces from the assassination attempt so it would be tidy and welcoming once he was discharged. During one visit he said Natasha must have stopped by, as the bugs that had been in his apartment, that Fury and SHIELD had placed there long ago, had been neatly deactivated and left on the kitchen counter. Steve didn’t tell him that Natasha had been away for days, caught up in the courts.

When he’d returned home, he didn’t breathe a word to anyone about the… visits. He wasn’t sure if they really happened, or if his own desperate hope was playing tricks on him. Steve swore that sometimes he would return home to find something _off_ ; a paper on his desk moved a half-inch to the left, some drops of water by the sink, the blanket on the couch folded a bit differently than he remembered, and, most alarmingly, a single, minuscule drop of blood he’d found on the windowsill. He told himself it had to be Bucky, that he knew where he lived, could easily sneak in. It was one of the reasons he’d denied moving after the dumping of SHIELD intel; Bucky knew his way here, he could find his way back if he needed him. It sounded absurd even to him, but there was a tiny bit of hope that maybe, just maybe, he’d wake up one day to find his friend at the door. A foolish hope, he knew, but optimism was one thing that he never could quite shake. He left his window unlocked anyway, just in case he wasn’t as delusional as he feared.

Although SHIELD had fallen, that didn’t mean he was free of service. He kept ties with the rest of the Avengers, with Fury and Agent Hill, more to assure himself he wasn’t going at this alone than to look for a mission. Even though Hill had given him his shield, plucked from the Potomac by some divers searching for bodies, he couldn’t find it in himself to go aid in the scattered attacks against HYDRA hotspots. After everything that had happened, he wasn’t sure if he could trust himself with what remained of SHIELD. At least, not immediately. He trusted the _members_ of SHIELD, but his faith in the organization itself had crumbled with the Insight Helicarriers. If something as catastrophic and dangerous as HYDRA had gone unnoticed within their ranks for so long, who knew what else could be growing just out of sight.

Sam would stop over at his apartment, check up on him and give him a call every once and a while when he couldn’t join in his search. Some days he searched alone. Sam was well-meaning, and he enjoyed the company and support of his friend, but some days he just needed to be alone, to try and find Bucky on his own. He knew he was out there, somewhere, and he was determined to find him. He’d seen glimpses of him, just out of the corner of his eye or out in plain sight, looking right at him, but he always vanished before he could get close enough. Natasha was right, he really was a ghost.

It was almost he was playing a game, some strange version of cat and mouse, except instead of him looking for Bucky, his friend was the cat, making himself visible just long enough to get his attention before disappearing into the background. He wasn’t sure why he was doing this; was he trying to draw him into a fight? Had he been captured and redeployed by HYDRA? Was it some silent plea for help? Steve didn’t know; he didn’t know a lot of things these days, but he knew for sure he wasn’t going to give up on Bucky.

This has been going on for a few weeks. He didn’t tell Sam or Natasha about it since, honestly, he had no way to prove if it’s really Bucky he’s seeing. Maybe the nightmares were leaking into his waking hours. He didn’t do his usual laps around the reflecting pool with Sam most days, usually just sitting in the shade of a tree while the Falcon did his rounds, thankful for the bit of fresh air and company. Some days he swore he could see a fleeting shadow, a flutter of movement and a dim flash of silver metal. If Bucky was trying to kill him, like Natasha feared he might be, then he had had plenty of opportunities to do so.

The nights were the worst. He’d been spending a lot of time at Sam’s VA meetings, then lingering out well past dark, wandering the city aimlessly. Sometimes he searched, other times he just walked. And walked, and walked, as if by walking maybe he’d be able to escape the guilt preying on him, escape his failure to protect his best friend who had protected and cared for him for as long as he could remember. Sleep was rare, and when it came it was fitful and filled with horrific visions. Memories of Bucky’s fall, the horrible instruments he’d seen that had been used on his friend to break him into their obedient weapon, images of Bucky alone, hurt and scared and withering away, or being tortured again by HYDRA. He woke up screaming his friend’s name commonly; he was secretly thankful that Agent 13 had moved on with the rest of SHIELD, leaving the rest of the floor vacant. She was nice, and had proven herself trustworthy during Insight, but the thought of being looked after was--

“Hey, you alright?” Sam’s voice shook Steve out of his thoughts, blinking and turning to look at him. He’d been staring off into empty space; Sam said he’d been doing that a lot recently. “The meeting’s over, everyone’s gone,” he started, jacket slung over his shoulder, “It’s getting pretty dark out. Not that I don’t think you can’t handle yourself, ‘cause I know you can, but you should get home and get some rest.” There was a bit of an edge to his voice, as if he was silently saying ‘you look awful you need to get some good sleep’. He’d come to another of his VA meetings, not so much for the help, but just to get him out of the apartment. He’d had no recent leads in his search leaving him somewhat restless, the normally welcoming space he called home now seemed oppressive and cramped, choking even.

“M’fine, thanks for asking, though.” a blatant lie that he hoped Sam wouldn’t see through; Natasha still said his lying was some of the worst she’d ever seen. He highly doubted it was _that_ bad. The skeptical look his got from Sam, however, shot down that confidence.

“Yeah, sure, whatever you say, Rogers.” The sarcasm was thick in his voice, but he didn’t press the issue any further. He knew when he could and couldn’t push Steve, and he had a feeling he was having a particularly off day. “Really though, go home and sleep. I want to see you bright and early tomorrow so I can embarrass myself trying to keep up with you at the reflecting pool.” He clapped a hand lightly on Steve’s shoulder, a reassuring gesture, before he grabbed the rest of his things.

They said their farewells, and once again Steve was alone. The sky was already black, the light of the city drowning out the stars. A brisk wind brushed past him, carrying with it the scent of the Potomac and a feeling of unease. The air was cold, uncomfortable and almost abrasive against his skin; the seasons were just starting to shift, and now the nights were filled with air that drained warmth and offered only a sharp, unfeeling embrace. His bolstered metabolism meant that the cold rarely bothered him, but he wore a jacket anyway, leaving it unzipped to slip out of should someone grab him. Natasha had teased saying he wouldn’t need to pay for heat in winter with how warm he was. He’d smiled at that. Tony commented that “I can’t believe you didn’t just melt yourself out of that capsickle”. He hadn’t found that funny.

The Captain walked, hands stuffed into his pockets, eyes slightly downward. There’s hardly anyone out at this time of night and he’s quietly relieved; he’s noticed now that, after everything that happened at SHIELD, crowds have begun making him nervous. It wasn’t an outright fear, but it wasn’t easily dismissed after the stunt the Strike team pulled in the elevator. He’d decided against riding his motorcycle to the meeting, opting for the long walk instead, hoping it’d give him a bit more time to think and shake some of the idleness out of him. Natasha had told him he was going to rust his creaky old bones if he didn’t get out and do things, and he’d laughed at first until he thought of Bucky.

_Bucky._

A knot of tension built in his shoulders. The familiar sense of urgency swelled in his chest, his pace quickening in response. _I need to find him_. He instinctively grabbed at his arm, grasping for the shield that wasn’t there. He’d started leaving it at home, not wanting to draw attention to himself; as safe as it made him feel, it wasn’t exactly subtle and he was far from helpless without it. But it was a safety net of sorts, a tie back to his past, his past with the Howling Commandos, with Bucky. The endless, fruitless searches were wearing him ragged. With each dead end his desperation grew. _Maybe this time, maybe this time_. Natasha had given him all the information she could scrounge up, but even then the trails went cold. The Winter Soldier had vanished just as silently and invisibly as snow melting in the sun.

The sound of a couple laughing with each other distracted him momentarily as he passed them, only sparing them a glance as he continued down the sidewalk and turned onto his street. Shops were closing up or long since dim, and in a city of so many people, Steve suddenly felt very alone. He felt ostracized, alienated, lost in a time not his own. Everything had changed so much and he was rushing to catch up, yet felt like he was just falling more and more behind. The city was quiet; he was a city boy by heart, and when the city was this quiet it was somewhat unnerving. He was accustomed to the sounds and lights and never-ending bustle.

Steve arrived at his building soon enough, the cold of the air suddenly unbearable. He couldn’t help but to think of Bucky alone in this. There mere thought of it seemed to let the chill into his soul. The soldier shuddered involuntarily, climbing the stairs up to his apartment. Fumbling through his pockets produced his door keys, but as he was about to unlock it he spotted something. The doorknob was slightly tilted, a single rust-colored mark blemishing the metal. _Blood?_ The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, heart beginning to thud loudly against his ribs as the feeling of no longer being alone descended on him. Bright eyes scanned for anything different, even the smallest thing that looked out of place was now suspect, but saw nothing else.

The door was abandoned, the window the only other choice until he figured out what was wrong. It was entirely possible his nerves were getting the better of him, but better safe than dead. HYDRA could very well have set a trap in his apartment, like how they had cornered Fury for the kill. _Or it could be Bucky._ The thought made his heart skip, movements quickening as the window was opened, quietly as he could, slipping inside the darkened apartment.

 _I should have left a light on._ He crouched below the open window with his back pressed to the wall, waiting for his eyes to adjust before he so much as dared to move. Nothing immediately looked out of place; there was nothing he didn’t remember being there before. His shield was even untouched, glinting faintly from where the Captain could see it leaning against the wall in the sitting room. It was a small reassurance. He’d been so tense, so nervous the past few weeks that maybe it was all catching up to him.

Steve stood and walked as silently as he could, moving along the wall between him and most of the sitting room. He wanted to get his shield before he swept the rest of the apartment. The thought of sending a text to Natasha flitted across his mind. They had set up a series of innocuous sayings to send to one another if one needed assistance, and although she was halfway across the world doing God knows what it wouldn’t hurt to give her a head’s up. Always listening, always silent, he pulled the phone from his pocket and opened a text message. _‘Have you seen my sketchbook?’_ was hastily entered, code for ‘something’s wrong but no immediate danger’.

As soon as the message was sent he heard a soft noise in the sitting room, the sound of stiff fabric sliding and metal creaking. His heart leapt into his throat. The phone was roughly shoved back into his pocket, forgotten quickly as he edged noiselessly to the corner of the wall. He knew he should grab a weapon, grab something to defend himself with, but if it really was Bucky the sight of a weapon might set him off. He was going to wait. He had to see with his own eyes first. The edge of the wall came agonizingly slowly, but as soon as he was there, crouched and ready to spring back should an attack be waiting, did he peek around the corner into the darkened sitting room.

There was a stray shaft of light filtering through the curtains, falling across the couch, illuminating a crumpled form huddled up in one corner of it. If Steve hadn’t been alerted to something being amiss in the apartment, he would have passed it off as a discarded jacket he’d forgotten to put away. But he knew better. _Bucky_. The dark form’s side rose and fell without a sound, his breathing almost imperceptible in the dark. His position was contorted and looked in no way comfortable; his flesh and bone arm was tucked tight against his chest and partly hidden behind the knees pulled up to his stomach, with his metal limb resting on top of his leg, fingers loosely wrapped around the hilt of a blade anchored in his boot. It was clear that he would be up and armed within seconds of being alerted of a potential threat. With how he faced the door from his curled position he was very glad he’d opted for his unorthodox entrance.

Steve exhaled the breath he’d subconsciously held, scared to so much as blink, fearing that if he did so his friend would evaporate into the shadows. _Is this real? Is he really here?_ A minute ticked by before he worked up the nerve to move, stepping incredibly lightly for someone of his build. He moved within a few feet of the couch, silently thankful for not remembering to pull the blinds all the way shut earlier, as it let in just enough light for him to get a good look at him. His swelling hope was dashed almost instantly. Bucky was real and not just a trick of the light, he was sure of that now, but he looked so different from their last encounter on the Helicarrier.

Bucky looked awful. Absolutely awful. James Buchanan Barnes, a man who’d once prided himself on his appearance for the dames, was sullied with soot and dirt, dried mud caked to his skin and clothing; blood that was still crimson and tacky was splattered across his artificial arm and Steve didn’t know who it belonged to. It must have been the source of the spot on the doorknob. What made his happiness at finally finding his friend wither the most was Bucky’s physical condition. He was so thin, thin to the point that he looked as if he hadn’t eaten a thing since the fall of Project Insight. Steve grimly realized that that was a distinct possibility and his stomach turned in response. Bucky had always been on the lean side, but he looked heartbreakingly fragile in this state; he knew he could likely still outpace and kill him even in his depleted state, but God did he look like he would break at the slightest touch.

It was then he noticed the shivering. He’d missed it at first, too caught up in his own shock, but he was shivering and shaking, sometimes faintly and sometimes enough that his breathing would hitch. It was like he was suffering from some intense cold that only he could sense. The air in the apartment was cool but not unpleasantly so, definitely warmer than the outside, yet he was shivering as if he’d been dunked in cold water. He knew it was stupid, that it’d likely end up with him getting stabbed at best, but he couldn’t stand to see him shivering like that. It made him think about how scared he must have felt, alone and injured in the snow at the bottom of that ravine. At least this time he could try and help, even though it might end with his blood being shed. 

Steve was careful to be as quiet as he could, sliding the jacket off of his shoulders without looking away from the sleeping assassin. It wasn’t much, just the leather jacket he typically wore when on his motorcycle, but it was warm from his body heat. He figured that, since it was smaller than the blanket at the opposite end of the couch, it wouldn’t tangle up around Bucky while he slept; that would no doubt end disastrously if he woke up and tried to move and couldn’t. He had seen the restraints on the chair in that horrific place, and never wanted to remind Bucky of that nightmare ever again.

There was a moment of hesitation before he ever so carefully draped the jacket over Bucky’s body, praying that he wouldn’t wake up and try and run. The moment it covered him the soldier froze, frame suddenly tense and breathing all but silent. Steve let go of the article, glancing to his shield a few feet to his right, holding his breath. _It’s alright, Buck; you’re safe_. He didn’t dare speak it but it helped to think the words at him. Those few seconds seemed to drag on for hours until the tenseness left his friend, thin fingers hesitantly curling around the edge of the jacket and pulling it tight to his body. It was such an easily dismissible gesture but it meant the world to Steve.

The shivering continued, albeit diminished, but the Captain decided that was enough dancing with fate. He backed away, towards his shield, wanting to retrieve it before Bucky woke up. He had a lot of faith that he could bring his friend back, that Bucky could pull himself out of the Winter Soldier, but he wasn’t stupid. If he could avoid letting something turn into a potential weapon in the soldier’s hands then he was going to do so. He never turned his back to him, always facing him, just in case. Fingers brushed the top of the shield, the vibranium cold and unyielding yet comforting nonetheless. If he moved it out of sight then maybe—

The text alert on his phone broke the silence, sounding impossibly loud in the small apartment.

Steve stopped breathing, rooted to the spot when he saw Bucky’s eyes flash open, looking right at him. Neither man dared to move, completely immobile and eyes locked as they became aware of the other’s conscious presence. There wasn’t an emotion to be seen in those blue eyes of his, and they seemed to stare right through him. A flicker of movement and his gaze had cut to the shield, and Steve realized in dawning horror just how damning of a position he was in; standing a scant few yards away with a hand on his shield was hardly an innocent stance.

“No its alr—“ he had only a fleeting warning before the soldier was upon him. The jacket had delayed him a precious half-second, giving Steve just enough time to hastily raise his shield in a halfhearted defensive reflex. Bucky leapt at him like a jungle cat, the sound of his metal arm and the knife it held colliding with the shield almost deafening after such prolonged silence. The force of it caused the shield to slam into his chest, the Captain losing his precarious footing and the both of them tumbling back and slamming against the far wall in a heap. The air was knocked from Steve’s lungs, leaving him gasping for breath as he saw the shadowy form that was Bucky rise up like a cobra to strike with that single metal fang.

It was a reflex more than anything that compelled Steve to kick the man away when he lunged for his throat; the resulting scream of pain, however, was completely unexpected. _I hurt him_. There was no time to panic as Bucky rebounded off of the couch, rolling off to Steve’s left into a crouched stance, blade angled out with the hilt turned inward to his stomach. The movements were stiff, slowed, lacking in the predatory grace that had nearly killed the Captain previously but still just as precise and efficient. His right arm remained cradled to his chest as if crippled, seemingly useless. The sight of it caught Steve’s attention for the briefest of moments, his attempt to stand paused, and it was all the opening the soldier needed to strike. Metal screeched as the blade glanced off of the shield, biting into shirt and skin instead of throat. Even injured and malnourished the assassin’s reflexes were impeccable, and before he could even blink Steve found himself pinned to the floor, Bucky’s knee jammed into his ribs with his full weight on his sternum. 

“Buck—“ his voice was little more than a pathetic wheeze, unable to get air back into his lungs with the assassin’s weight on top of him. It was almost impossible to make out any details on the man’s face in the dark, especially now that his head was swimming from colliding with the wall. Movement out of the corner of his eye made him tense in expectation of a blade plunging into his chest, but a second later he heard the weapon clang to the floor as the other leaned closer.

“Ингалятор?”

Bucky’s voice was quiet, rough with disuse and thickly accented, but the tone wasn’t aggressive. Concerned was the wrong word, but it wasn’t angry or demanding or mocking; it was a question. It took him a moment to recognize the language. Steve regretted never thinking to brush up on basic Russian during his search, as he had no idea what he was saying to him. “Ингалятор?” he asked again, removing himself from on top of him and moving to his side. Steve gasped loudly, thankful to be able to breathe again, but also hopelessly confused. _Does he recognize me? What is he saying?_

“Где твой ингалятор?” more words he couldn’t even begin to fathom, but he sounded somewhat alarmed. Metal clinked faintly and Steve suddenly felt the soldier’s metallic hand grasp his upper arm, pulling him up into a sitting position with a painstaking delicateness, as if fearing he would shatter like glass. The upright posture greatly eased the strain in his lungs, taking several minutes to get his breathing evened; he felt the coolness of Bucky’s hand pressed against his back the entire time, occasionally brushing it gently up and down his spine when he coughed particularly hard. What was he trying to do? Steve looked over to scrutinize the other’s face, not expecting to see such a softened expression on his features.

“… Bucky?” he tried once more, voice as gentle as he could manage considering he was still a bit winded. Blue eyes blinked before narrowing, some of the softness draining from his face as the hand was withdrawn cautiously. It was as if he was confused, conflicted, and unsure of himself. Eyes darted under messy, unkempt hair from Steve’s face to the knife-inflicted cut on his arm, to the shield, and back again. There was a sudden sense of dread as he feared his friend was lapsing back into his combative mindset.

“I…” the other’s words were hardly above a whisper, “… I know you.” Thank God, English, but at the same time the answer was equal parts relieving and concerning. “What were you doing?”

“Y-yeah, you do, Buck,” Steve spoke as gently as he could, as if he was consoling a wild animal, “I just gave you my jacket. I came home and found you asleep. You were shivering and I just wanted to make sure you were warm enough.” His voice was still somewhat strained, but he never dropped his calm tones. He could see that his body was wound up in tense readiness again, and he feared that he’d make a try for the still-open window if he was given any reason to startle. “I’ve been looking for you every—“

“I know.” The response was cold and quick, a drastic shift from mere moments ago. The man formerly known as Bucky stood, the predatory gleam starting to shine through his eyes again. Steve recognized that he was losing him, but trying to force him to do anything would do far more harm than any good. He couldn’t force any part of this; if he did, he told himself he’d be no better than the HYDRA agents that had ruined him so badly in the first place. He needed to try something else, but before he could think of anything the assassin spoke.

“… you’re… taller than I remember.” The words were chosen carefully, eyes averted in concentration. All of that earlier optimism crept back into Steve’s mind. He smiled and shook his head a bit, gaze down on his shield which was left abandoned at his feet. Memories of his dangerous rescue from the HYDRA base came back, remembering how Bucky had been so surprised to see him that he’d forgotten all about his own injuries.

“You said the same thing when I rescued you from—“ when the Captain glanced back over to where the other man had been there was nothing there. Gone. His heart skipped, half expecting an attack, but a single soft footstep outside in the hall told him that he’d escaped out of the open window. His heart sank, but at the same time, he’d spoken. _He remembered_. If only he hadn’t startled him so badly then maybe he could have convinced him to stay. Brushing his hand over his arm, the warm tackiness of the blood there assured him that yes, he hadn’t just imagined all of that, it’d been real.

There was little chance he’d be back again tonight, but just in case he did, Steve went around the house and checked everything. The window was closed partly, leaving enough of it open for Bucky to open it easily if he returned, with some thick blankets, a small first-aid kit and some water left on the table next to the couch. There must have been a reason he’d come, and he was confident that he’d return eventually. He just hoped he’d be ready and not muck it up next time.

Absentmindedly, Steve pulled the phone from his pocket, reading the text that had set off the confrontation. It was from Natasha. _‘Did you check on the windowsill?’_ was what the text read, ‘has something happened?’ being the meaning. He considered telling her what had happened, about the accidental attack and the Soviet’s horrible shape, but he kept it to himself. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust her, it was that he was rather sure Bucky didn’t want anyone to know about his whereabouts. Anyone other than him, it seemed.

 _‘Found it’_ he replied, an ‘all clear’, hesitating a few moments before typing another message. _‘What does “ingalyata” mean?’_ he had no idea how the Russian word Bucky had uttered was spelled, so he hoped she got the gist of it. There was no hope of him remembering the sentence. He felt like he should be happy, relieved that he’d confirmed that his friend was still alive, but instead he felt empty, perhaps even worse than when he’d been left wondering over his fate. He was alive, but he had scared him into an attack, sent him running, and hurt him. _Some friend_. With a quiet sigh he walked into his room, lying down and sinking into the mattress, eyes trained blankly on the ceiling. Hours might have passed, he had no idea, and he only looked away when he heard the text chime.

_‘That’s Russian for inhaler. Where’d you hear that?’_


	3. Lost, Broken, Bloodied

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is sort of long and I'm kinda sorry about that but hey, we're back to Bucky!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains blood, slight gore and an off-hand mentioning of vomiting. If that bothers you, please take care!

"Alright Rogers, opening a conversation with 'hey do you know how to treat a starving person' makes me think something happened that I should know about."

Steve sighed loudly, leaning back in his chair a bit heavily as he watched Natasha from across the small kitchen table they were both seated at. The apartment was empty of others save for the two of them, although the signs of the scuffle were still present. It'd been a day since he'd found Bucky in his apartment, and as soon as morning had come around he had called her, saying he needed help. She'd come immediately, departing from somewhere in Europe and arriving the morning after. The sun had only just come up, and both of them had had fitful nights and were nursing coffees to try and get themselves operational. He trusted Natasha, more than he let on some days, but this was a delicate topic. With HYDRA lurking around, he had a lingering fear of dragging the spy back into the fray after all the fighting she'd been doing following the SHIELD fallout.

"Let me guess," she idly tapped her phone that rested on the table, looking over to the Captain, "… you found him." it wasn't a question, but a statement. She knew. There was no use in trying to bury it under misinformation. Then again, why would he even do that? He'd asked for her help after all. It defeated the purpose to have her fly all the way back just to lie about the reason.

"… more like he found me." Steve mumbled his words a bit before taking a sip of his coffee, "I caught him asleep on the couch. He looked awful, Natasha. He was injured and… he looked so thin." That last statement was hardly above a whisper, weary eyes staring blankly into his coffee. He could still vividly picture just how withered he'd become, his body wiry and sunken and so disarmingly fragile looking.

The red-head's eyes narrowed a bit in thought, free hand loosely wrapped around the handle of her own mug of coffee. "So that's why you asked that." She didn't sound surprised in the slightest; she'd likely figured out just why he was asking such a question, and for her help, easily enough considering the text about the Russian word. "It's entirely possible he hasn't eaten. I don't know for sure in his case, but they could have possibly used a nutrient mixture given intravenously through a drip while waking him instead of actual food. Standard practice in medical cases; gives the cells and body everything it needs and bypasses digestion entirely. Probably gave him some sort of simple balanced supplement once he was up and functioning and out in the field."

Steve glanced at her and swallowed thickly, mouth suddenly far too dry for his liking yet he couldn't bring himself to take another drink. Back when they had lived in Brooklyn, when times were lean, they'd frequently gone hungry for days at a time; when Bucky eventually scrounged up enough money to buy food almost all of it was given to him. _Don't worry Steve, I ate some while I was walking home_ he would assure, but now Steve was sure he had likely lied to make sure he ate as much as he could.

"It's effective for their purposes, but using it for an extended time?" Natasha paused, taking a brief drink from her mug, "That's bound to have some serious consequences. His stomach's so disused it probably can't handle any food he's able to easily get his hands on." She said a bit too casually considering the subject matter, fiddling around with her phone, doing something that Steve couldn't see. There was an unspoken statement of _they didn't care about his health in the long run since he's ultimately disposable and did whatever was most efficient_. Sometimes he forgot that topics like this had been almost commonplace for her in the past.

There was a moment of silence, not uncomfortable but not relaxed either, as the soldier's thoughts were gathered and mulled through. It made a lot of sense, however disturbing it may have been, but it left the problem of how they were going to get Bucky healthy again. There had to be some way to safely build his strength back, but he couldn't think of one. He'd always been on the receiving end of medical care as a kid, not the one giving it.

"… and this is HYDRA we're talking about," she added suddenly, brushing a strand of hair out of her face, "they probably had him drugged with who knows what. Coming down off of that stuff has probably taken a toll on him too; we need to get him looked at by a professional."

That was entirely out of the question. Bucky wouldn't even let him near, so a complete stranger? That was just a disaster waiting to happen. "He's in rough shape, but he was alert and responsive when he woke up." Steve said with that never-fading bit of hope in his voice.

"Oh I put that together," Natasha rolled her eyes a bit, "The blood stains and the broken drywall were pretty telling, Rogers." It'd been the first thing she noticed after walking into the apartment, along with the Russian-made knife that Steve had left out on the kitchen table, blade discolored with dried blood. Besides it wasn't as if Steve had hidden the events of the night from her.

There was a loud exhale as Steve set his mug down on the kitchen table, absentmindedly rubbing at the bandaged wound on his arm where Bucky had managed to draw blood. "It was my fault, I startled him." He didn't mention that it was actually Natasha's text that had woken up the soldier, "He was shivering so I covered him up in my jacket and I guess I wasn't as quiet as I thought I was."

A moment of silence passed before the spy groaned loudly, holding her head in her hand. "… what did I tell you about trusting, Rogers?" she waved her hand in an exasperated gesture, looking at him with the sort of disappointment a mother might use on a disobedient child, "I know he means a lot to you but he's _not_ your friend right now. Maybe he was, maybe he will be again, I don't know, but right now he's still the Winter Soldier and he won't hesitate to attack you. Getting yourself killed isn't going to help anyone, _especially_ not him."

Steve fell silent after that, eyes focused on the coffee slowly cooling in his mug. As difficult as it was to think about, Natasha had a very good point. Bucky wasn't his friend right now. He wasn't the same charmer from Brooklyn who had always pulled him, bleeding and bruised, from the alleyways and patched him up with teasing scolds and gentle hands. He knew that the decades of abuse and horrors of HYDRA have changed his friend, but Steve adamantly believed that James Buchanan Barnes was still in there, somewhere, buried under the ruthless guise of the Winter Soldier. It was just a matter of breaking through to him.

"What did he do, besides attack you?" it wasn't much of a subject change, but he guessed that she needed to know just what had happened to figure out how they should proceed. A moment of silence passed, Steve breathing deeply for a moment, sorting through the night's events to make sure he didn't miss anything.

"After he… calmed down, he said he knew me." Voice hardly audible, he interlaced his fingers in front of him, head down as he leaned on his elbows, "… he must have thought I was having an asthma attack when he knocked the wind out of me. He asked for an inhaler, at least, I think he was. You said that word meant inhaler and he was asking me that." Shoulders tense, he drew a sharp breath, "… he helped me sit up, sat with me until my breathing got better. He's starting to remember, Natasha, I just wish I could do more to—"

The warmth of Natasha's hands gently encompassing his own made him stop, breathing hitching a bit as he hid his face in his upper arm. He hadn't realized his voice had cracked and he was dangerously close to tears. She rubbed her thumb gently over his knuckles, trying to help him calm down. This being a delicate topic for him was one hell of an understatement. Minutes passed, breathing quieted, and Steve eventually lifted his gaze again.

"… it'll be alright, Steve, don't worry." Her voice was soft, eyes sympathetic, "I won't give up on him if you won't. None of us will." She probably meant the rest of the Avengers, "But you just need to be a little more careful next time. I know it's against your style, but this time you need to put yourself and your safety first. Now, he clearly sought you out, waited for you, and he remembered you, correct?" there was a brief nod in response, "Well that's progress. If he was sleeping then he must feel safe enough to do so here at least. There's seventy years of programming and damage to sort through, Rogers, it's going to take time and the only person who can decide when that sorting happens is James." She squeezed his hand reassuringly before giving him a wry smile. "Or, we could always try a little 'mental recalibration' like with Barton…"

He couldn't help it and exhaled quickly, the corner of his lip turning up just the slightest bit. They had both lost someone to the control of others, and since Clint had been pulled out of it he was sure Bucky could too. It was just a matter of helping him through the process when he was ready to try. "Thanks, Nat." he was grateful; she was always a good person to talk to when one needed solid, truthful advice. She patted his hands before releasing her hold on them, taking a quick drink of her now-cool coffee. The muffled alert chime of her phone drew her attention, tapping the screen a few times to scroll through something.

"Ah, Banner got back to me." Natasha sat down her mug, picking the phone up and cradling it in her palm to read from, "He says if he's too thin that regular food might make him sick and to try milk, fruit juices and soups until he gets some more strength back. He'd like to get a look at him in person but only if he's comfortable with it, and wants to know if he had any injuries or illnesses that you were aware of."

Steve thought quietly for a minute, making a mental tally of what he thought Bucky's condition might be. He wasn't terribly concerned that Bruce now knew about Bucky; he trusted the man, and he knew he likely wouldn't do a thing to endanger Bucky. Then again, there was a good chance that Natasha hadn't even used a name when asking for the doctor's advice. Bruce was kind enough to give his advice freely if there was any chance it might help someone; a quality that Steve placed in very high regard.

"He was shivering badly, even though it wasn't really cold." Steve started, "He might have some wounds as there was blood on his metal arm, but I never got the chance to tell if it was his or… someone else's." that left a bad taste in his mouth, talking about how his friend might have attacked someone. Natasha didn't react. "And… his arm. His real arm looked really bad. He kept it to his chest and when I kicked him off I think I hit it because he… screamed." The sound of Bucky's scream of pain was going to haunt him. "I think it might be from when I… when I was fighting him, on the Helicarrier. It might be broken or something might be dislocated, I'm not sure. I didn't think I'd hurt him that badly, but everything happened so fast that I don't really know." He couldn't hide the slight shame in his voice.

The following silence was filled with the occasional click of Natasha's nails as she relayed that information back to Banner via a text message. "You know, if it were up to me, I'd try bringing him to Stark's place in New York." She glanced over to Steve after sending the message, and rolled her eyes a bit upon seeing his look, "Yeah I know that might seem like a bad idea to you, but we need to think about the long term. HYDRA knows about your place here, and James is going to need some specialized care and Banner could get a look at him. Not to mention Stark's building is more secure than the Pentagon and was fitted up to contain Banner if the Hulk was ever triggered so I don't see the Winter Soldier getting out of it or hurting himself on accident. Maybe we can move him there if you manage to get him to stay with you. Sam could come too; with all the military secrets dumped and his hand in HYDRA's fall, he might be in danger too. So, just consider it, okay?"

"… I'll consider it." Steve eventually replied, taking a sip of his coffee as if in defeat. There was no arguing with Natasha, and she was almost always right anyway. "I have to get Bucky to trust me first, though, and we can worry about the rest later." His primary concern was trying to get Buck healthy and cared for and _safe_. If that meant abandoning the compromised apartment and going to the former Stark tower to help keep his friend safe, then he would do so in a heartbeat. He just hoped that Bucky would be willing to work towards healing, and that he would let them help.

"I'm going to stay in town for a while, Rogers." It wasn't up for negotiation, her tone made it obvious, "If he makes himself known again I want you to let me know. I won't interfere, but we have to be ready in case he still has a kill mission on you. I also want to speak with Sam and see if he's up for going to New York with us if we manage to convince Barnes to cooperate. Nick and I have negotiated and kept the FBI off of him for the time being, but we need to get to him before someone else does. I'll be close by if you need me." She downed the rest of her coffee at that, setting the mug down before getting to her feet. "I'm going to meet up with Sam. You should go get some of the stuff Banner suggested. Just try and relax today and try not to get so worked up. If he really knows you, then he'll come to you eventually."

***

Evening had long since fallen, the chill of night picking at the edges of his meager jacket as he silently made his way through the quieting city. The asset was walking, passing closed shops and tracing streets he didn't know. It was all he could do; although it was slowly deteriorating, the programming HYDRA had so painstakingly perfected over the decades forbid him from remaining idle. He'd never been awake this long before, never gone so long without a command or mission or order, and he had no idea what to do anymore.

The hunger pains had long ago faded into a hot, empty ache; easy enough to ignore but pressuring nonetheless. He'd tried eating within the first week, when the constant protests of his body had gotten too much to bear. It'd been a mistake, he'd figured that out quickly; he'd vomited soon afterwards, system unable to handle it, leaving him feeling worse than he had previously. Sometimes he got lucky, picking something that didn't make him sick, but this was few and far between and hardly took the edge off. He'd decided eating was too much trouble and that the painful longing for food was preferable to the possibility of making himself ill.

Why he couldn't seem to eat, he didn't know; his handlers might have known, but they were dead and he was never stepping back into HYDRA's shadow again. The only memories he could turn up were of his handlers, after having revived and prepped him, giving him some sort of substance that was either solid or mush or somewhere between. He had no idea what it might have been, but it hadn't made him sick like some of things he managed to get and it had stopped the pain in his stomach. It must have been some sort of food, but the memories were fuzzy, broken, and provided little useful information.

His memory had improved in some areas and completely fallen through in others. The last several decades were nothing but a blur of screaming, pain, and cold that sank so deep into him it burned his bones. Just thinking about it caused him to shiver violently, pulling his torn jacket closer to his body. Some days he remembered whole conversations, entire sequences, but it was rare. Almost all of them consisted of the man named Bucky— _him?_ — and another one, usually scrawny, named Steve. _Steve._ Whenever he thought of him there was a strange sort of sensation in his chest, a sort of pained recognition, although the recognition part was shaky at best. He _knew_ him, but how or why, he had no idea.

He kept getting flashes, little crackles of memories, triggered by the oddest things. One minute he could be listening in on a conversation and have snippets of some foreign sequence of dialog begin to play in his head, garbled and difficult to decipher like an old record that time hadn't been kind to. Images too, actions that he couldn't recall yet his body seemed to remember. A few hours prior he'd passively watched two boys, brothers he assumed, as one tended to the other's scraped knees. It'd stirred something in him, something that had been buried deep down under layers and layers of HYDRA tampering. Or a few days back, when he saw a group of people ganging up on someone. He'd been a moment from intervening for who knew what reason when someone shouted for police. The police were to be avoided, so he avoided the scene as well, even though he was left with a lingering feeling of protectiveness for several hours that he had no way to explain away.

The Smithsonian had been an unexpected catalyst for these strange bursts of activity within his mind. He'd gone there within three days of dragging his target out of the river, trying to figure out just why he had done such a thing. He was an assassin, he murdered and killed and did nothing but destroy lives, so why had he gone and _saved_ his target's life? He'd never failed before, he could glean that much from the tangled mess of programming, yet he'd ignored everything to dive into the river and save that man from drowning. The exhibit had been plastered with the man he had saved, with aged photographs and paintings and items of all sorts. Some of the photographs were of a young, skinny boy, a boy with bright eyes and a lopsided smile. He knew him.

He hadn't expected to see his own face in that exhibit. Or, he thought it was his face. James Buchanan Barnes, that's what the placard had said, a handsome young man with a warmth and confidence to him. In all the pictures and paintings lining the exhibit he was always right at the other man's side; in the degraded film that flickered off to the corner, they both were talking, were _laughing_ with each other. He read how Captain Rogers had saved James Barnes in the war, that James Barnes was part of a unit called the 107th then the Howling Commandos, how James Barnes was killed in action, his body never found. James Barnes. _James Barnes_. He'd spoken the name aloud plenty of times since then, turned it in his mouth, tried to get the feel of it. It was familiar, yet felt awkward on his tongue when spoken.

The barking of a dog jarred the asset from his thoughts, body suddenly tense and eyes, hard as steel and just as cold, scanning his surroundings for any threat as he stopped in his tracks. His knife had been carelessly left behind in the apartment, when he'd been startled into an attack by his former target; maybe he was still his target, he wasn't sure. Another knife was produced from his pocket, not as large but just as deadly in his capable hands. His injured arm remained tucked rather close to his side, the jolt from being kicked still causing him considerable discomfort.

Another noise caught his attention. _Footsteps, ten feet behind to the right; they know my arm is injured_. His mind was just as methodical and calculating as it had been when he'd been under Pierce's thumb, and he was not unthankful for it. Metal fingers tightened around the handle of the combat knife, although he showed no outward signs of realizing he was being approached; to any passersby it merely looked as if he was staring off into the jeweled skyline of the Capital. The darkness would either be a great hindrance or a welcome advantage, but only time would tell.

 _Click_. The sound of the safety switching off of a pistol was all the prompting the asset needed. Moving with a speed unexpected in his depleted state he spun around, injured arm lashing out and shoving the pistol that had been aimed for his back away. A great blaze of light and concussive sound filled the street, the weapon discharging as the soldier plunged his knife deep into the chest of his would-be assailant. In that quarter second of movement he had searched, located and struck, the metal blade deftly gliding between ribs and into a lung. The air filled with the sharp scent of copper and iron as blood poured from the wound.

The haphazard discharge of the weapon had blasted a round into the sidewalk, the sound of it no doubt alerting every person within a two block radius. _I need to escape_. There was a wet, gurgling rattle of breath as the Soviet withdrew his blade, the man collapsing into a pool of his own blood, not dead but not quite alive. A flash of yellow on the arm of his jacket identified him as one of the SHIELD Strike team.

Dull fear prickled at his neck. _The Strike team?_ They had been tied to HYDRA, to Pierce. If there was one there had to be more, and they had to be coming for him. He made it two steps before he heard the crack of a sniper rifle, echoing off some far-off building. The next few seconds blurred together, but he remembered being knocked off his feet, air forced from his lungs as he hit the brick wall of the building next to him, knife clamoring from his hand. Heat blossomed on his back, a burst of wet crimson that trickled down his spine as a bullet planted itself squarely into his right shoulder blade. The choking cry of surprise that escaped him startled him; he hadn't heard his own voice since he'd been caught in the apartment— _the apartment._

The pain hadn't hit him yet, but his body felt like ice. His legs were sluggish underneath him as he struggled to his feet, bolting into an alleyway as he heard another bullet slam into the wall behind him. It'd been a low shot, as if for his leg. _They want me alive_. The thought filled him with a sick dread as he realized that they wanted to put him back on his leash, or worse, put him down so he couldn't spill their secrets, although he had no secrets to tell. At least, not as he was now.

Shouts of men filled the street. "Down the alleyway!" and "He's getting away!" among other things he couldn't catch. The pain was starting to filter into his awareness, starting as an acidic heat that slowly built in on itself. His heart was pounding, lungs heaving, as he tried to lose the Strike team in the maze of back alley streets. He needed to get to the apartment. In all honesty he wasn't sure why he knew he needed to get there, but he did. Some long-buried instinct told him to go, to seek out Captain Rogers, to get someplace safe. For whatever reason, his instincts seemed to equate the man with safety.

As he rounded a corner, two Strike members spotted him, shouting loudly to others. A Russian swear hissed under the soldier's breath, narrowly avoiding another bullet aimed for his legs. His reflexes were slowing, he could feel it, his strength draining from the wound the harder he pushed himself. A pistol was produced from his pocket, only two rounds fired with the same deadly precision he had used to change history numerous times. The first man dropped in a heap, not even getting the luxury to realize he had been hit. The other's ribs popped wetly as the bullet tore open his side, letting out a ghastly cry as he tumbled to the ground and didn't get back to his feet.

Without a moment's hesitation the Soviet was gone, vanishing into the darkness like the ghost he was before more of the Strike team could arrive. Rain earlier in the day had slickened the streets, helping to hide his trail of blood as he snaked his way through the sleeping city. He had no idea how long he was running and barely had any recollection of where he was going, his body operating almost entirely on instinct by the time he reached that familiar building. His running had slowed to a staggering shamble, forcing his legs, which he lost feeling in about three minutes ago, to climb up the flight of stairs.

His breathing came with difficulty, his limbs heavy and blood like ice. The worn clothing he had been wearing was soaked through with his own blood, which still bubbled from the sniper's bullet. His mind hazily realized they must have used some sort of special round to keep from killing him, but it was a cold comfort, the fact that HYDRA wanted him back alive. The thought of being dragged back, to be forced again into that world of darkness and cold, caused his stomach to turn; he almost retched in the hallway, from both the fear and pain.

The door to the second floor apartment seemed like a nearly insurmountable obstacle. His glassed-over eyes darted from the knob to the floor, then to a small, out-of-place planter of tiny flowers. Barely a murmur of thought crossed his mind as he nudged it with his foot, exposing a key. He was too exhausted and in too much pain to question just why he believed there would have been a key there. The key was retrieved, clumsily inserted into the lock, and the door opened without protest; he could have kicked it open or picked the lock like last time, but he didn't have the time or strength to attempt it.

With a soft clink of metal the key fell from his trembling fingers to the floor, shakily standing at the threshold taking great, heaving breaths. His vision was growing blurry and his hearing muffled, but after a moment of hesitation he stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind him, the click of the lock oddly comforting. Movement in front of him, down the narrow hall, and he knew he wasn't alone. The pistol was still clutched in his left hand, the metal of his limb mired by blood and dirt from his fall. He tried to take another step but his body had had enough; the pistol dropped to the floor, abandoned, as he tried to steady himself by pressing that palm to the wall.

Something was spoken to him but he didn't catch it, gaze lifting to where he'd seen the movement earlier. Someone was standing a few yards away now. He didn't need to hear to know who it was. Breath was inhaled sharply, words attempted but failed. Captain Rogers. _Steve._ His whole body was shaking; it felt like the world was collapsing in on itself all around him. Underneath all the pain was a faint, lingering disappointment. _How did I fall for something that stupid?_ Such a textbook trap; a bait operative to keep him still for a sniper to pick off. Pain washed his thoughts away, a low whimper in his throat betraying the fact he was injured. He was going to go down, he felt it, and not a moment later did his right leg buckle, his whole body collapsing with it.

He fell into something warm and yielding, not hard floor like he expected, but he had no time to ponder it as the darkness closed in on him.


	4. Mechanical Sort of Rationality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little different than previous ones, but hey, character development is important! Also I figured a little break was in order considering what I have in store next chapter...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has a good deal of blood and injury, but nothing terribly explicit and little in the way of violence. However, if any of those things bother you please take care!!

Steve had been asleep when he heard the heavy footsteps followed by the door opening; at first he thought it might have been Natasha, but then he realized there was no way she would ever make that much noise. As soon as that realization sank in he procured his phone from the nightstand and typed a message to the spy. ' _You forgot your jacket_ ' was sent, the underlying meaning of 'something's very wrong and I need help immediately' would be plain as day to her. She had stayed with Sam for the night, and he knew she'd waste no time. The moment it had been sent he had slipped out of bed silently, shield retrieved from the bedside and brought into a defensive position. A million scenarios ran through his head, none of them pleasant, especially once the sharp scent of blood reached him.

To say he'd been surprised when he saw Bucky in the doorway was an understatement. He caught sight of the pistol the soldier held once he pushed the door shut behind him. _He's going to shoot me_ had been his first line of thought, and not a moment later he felt extremely guilty for immediately jumping to that conclusion. His body had eased a bit the moment the pistol was dropped, his own shield lowering and eventually dropped as well. If he had lowered his weapon, then he should as well. There was only a moment's hesitation before he edged forward, closing the gap between them. He stopped a few yards away, not wanting to make him feel cornered.

"Bucky?" he spoke softly, tone gentle and light. His heart skipped a beat when the soldier's head lifted and looked to him, but his hope died when he saw his face. His eyes were greyed, dull and empty and so very tired. The second he saw his legs buckle Steve was right there, catching him before he hit the ground. He'd expected him to struggle, to lash out and fight, not to just lie there limp in his grasp. It'd scared him more than when he'd found his throat clasped in that metal hand. The amount of blood covering his friend was terrifying; who knew how much he could spare to lose in his state.

It'd taken him all of two seconds to get the blood-matted hoody off of the assassin, exposing a torn shirt and a devastating wound on his shoulder. He dimly recalled seeing a similar wound on a soldier Bucky had picked off of his back in the war. A sniper in the city was alarming, but not as surprising as he would have liked. _Is HYDRA after him?_ The thought sank into his soul like a poisoned arrow.

"D-don't do this to me, Buck." Steve was practically begging, fingers numbed with shock pressed against the wound to the soldier's back in a desperate attempt to stem the bleeding. His other arm gently held him up, cradling him against his body as he tried not to dissolve into fearful panic. He'd helped treat plenty of wounds on the battlefield when one of his Commandos got hurt, but Bucky had always been more of the medic. He'd spent their entire childhood patching him up after getting into fights, after all.

The Captain put as much pressure as he dared on the wound, suddenly very conscious of his strength. Buck looked so delicate like this, and he wasn't sure if the bullet had caused a fracture. The irony of it all hit him suddenly; for most of their lives the situation had been reversed, with Bucky having to take care of fragile little Steve. How could things have gotten so mixed up and twisted? They'd just been two kids from Brooklyn; why did things end up like this?

Minutes seemed like hours, but eventually the bleeding slowed. Steve scarcely cared that his clothes were now stained with it, just relieved that the mortal danger was now diminished. He didn't waste any time trying to bandage the wound. Getting up and leaving him was not an option, not even for a moment, so he cannibalized his own shirt into a makeshift wrapping. He removed the soldier's shirt first, too dirty and mired with blood to salvage, and then folded up some of the fabric and pressed it to the injury. The bullet's possible presence in the wound was dimly acknowledged, but he didn't have the skill or tools to safely extract it. He would treat it proper later, once Natasha arrived, but for now his main focus was to keep the bleeding at a minimum. He broke down his shirt into strips of fabric, knotting it together and using it to secure the fabric pad to the wound.

Throughout the rough medical treatment Bucky hadn't so much as twitched. Steve could feel him breathing, and a quick check told him his pulse was stable, but slower than he would have liked. The serum they had injected him with might not as been as effective as his, but it was doing a fine enough job keeping him alive. Whether or not he could bounce back in his current state, however, remained to be seen.

"You're doing great, Bucky." The Captain was fully aware that he likely couldn't hear him, but it made him feel a little better to encourage him. He was sure he hadn't heard a kind word directed towards him in decades, and the thought made his heart ache. "You're gonna be fine, Buck, I promise." His voice hitched slightly, hands trembling as he gathered the assassin up into his arms. There was only the slightest whimper from him, sounding far too meek for someone who had just a few nights ago nearly killed the man now tending to him.

He considered moving him to the bedroom but decided against it; waking up somewhere completely foreign might be too great of a shock. Instead he placed him carefully on the sofa, onto his left side so that his breathing wouldn't be obstructed and his wound easily reached. Steve scarcely cared that there was blood all over the place; it wasn't even a lingering thought in his mind. His only concern was for his friend's welfare and comfort.

Natasha hadn't arrived yet, so he decided to chance leaving the assassin for a few moments to get some supplies. The longer he waited the more he risked Bucky waking up and lashing out, possibly violently, as he was sure to be confused and disoriented when he came to. A moment of—fear was the wrong word, apprehension was more apt—passed before he left the room, gathering up some medical supplies, some blankets and a clean shirt (he slipped on a new one of his own, one he wouldn't mind getting dirty), among other things. The shirt would be a bit big on Bucky and no doubt be soaked in blood by the time the night was out, but he didn't care in the slightest. When he had everything gathered he set it all inside his shield, picking it up. He didn't want to think about it, and told himself he was using it just to make it easier to carry everything, but he would need it in case Bucky woke in a panic like last time and lashed out.

As he reentered the room he shifted everything to one arm, using his free hand to fumble around until he hit the light switch. A small lamp flickered on, and the scene it revealed drew the blood from his face. The floor was smeared with so much crimson that he doubted the stains would ever lift. He pitied whoever moved in after he left. His spare key was abandoned on the floor, near the pistol that Bucky had dropped earlier. The ruined clothes he'd removed still lay on the floor; he'd be sure to dispose of them carefully. If HYDRA really was who had hurt him, then they would no doubt be looking for any sign of him.

The light cast a horrible realization of just how awful Bucky looked as well. Now without his shirt, Steve could see every little bruise, every wound that covered the assassin. His stomach turned in disgusted horror at the painful past each scar, each little mark told. Old injuries from knives, bullets and who knew what else were etched into his skin, telling a history devoid of peace and filled with violence. _If only I'd looked harder for you, Buck_. The guilt weighed heavily on him, sinking deeper into his bones than even the deathly chill of the arctic ice.

The self-loathing was pushed aside; he had a job to do and Bucky was counting on him. Without another moment wasted Steve dropped down in front of the couch, shield placed to his side as he dug through the contents. A washcloth was produced along with a bottle of disinfectant, wetting the fabric with it before he went to work on some of the smaller wounds. He was silently thankful for his unconsciousness, as he was sure there would be no way to do this had he been fully awake.

"I… I'm so sorry, Buck…" he wasn't even sure why he started talking, the words more or less just spilled out as he worked at his former comrade's wounds, "I should have been there for you. You were always there for me. When mom died, when I got pneumonia that one winter, you were always—" Steve's voice cracked faintly, vision threatening to blur before he forced himself to calm down. No, he needed to focus. Deep breaths, he told himself, deep breaths; he needed his full attention on his task. Bucky had come to him in this state, sought him out, that had to say _something_ about him. He was in no way foolish enough to believe that his friend was completely back, but it gave him hope that some part of the Bucky he knew was hidden somewhere underneath the Winter Soldier, that maybe he could bring back some of his friend's memories.

The soldier twitched slightly under his fingers as he worked on an old, infected wound on his side, curling into himself before letting out a pained whine. The former SHIELD agent hesitated at that, unsure if he should continue. If he was feeling the disinfectant that meant he had to be regaining consciousness. If he woke up with him hovering over him, covered in his blood and with no memory of how he got there, well, Steve wouldn't blame him in the slightest if he lashed out. He bit his lip, thinking for another moment, before he continued to clean the wound, taking care to be a bit gentler.

"It's okay, Buck, I promise…" he tried to soothe, even if he couldn't hear him yet, "You're safe, you're safe, you're safe…" he repeated it like a mantra as he finished with the wound, placing a pad of gauze over it and securing it with a little medical tape. He didn't dare touch the bullet wound now that he was capable of feeling pain, and he was also rather sure he'd need specialized help with it. Bruce was probably the best bet he had, but getting him there? That was another mess in and of itself.

The phone in his pocket vibrated (he'd learned his lesson about leaving the volume up) and he knew it had to be Nat. His hands were covered in blood, so even though he didn't want to, he got up and walked into the kitchen to clean them. He took care to be as quiet as he could, suddenly aware that not only could he disturb Bucky, but it was three in the morning and he had neighbors downstairs. They must be saints, putting up with the noise from earlier and not calling the landlord. He made a mental note to get them a thank you gift. The phone buzzed again, and a third time, and it made his nerves fray a bit.

Blood cleaned away, Steve dried his hands before pulling the phone from his pocket. A few buttons were pressed, and the message displayed. ' _Steve, they're everywhere_ ' that wasn't code, he realized. He felt a coldness in his stomach, knowing she was talking about HYDRA. ' _Did they get to you?_ ' the second message read, followed by ' _Sam's with me, we're safe, what about you?_ '

Steve was quiet for a moment before typing a reply. ' _I'm alright. He's here. He's hurt._ ' Codes be damned, he didn't have time to keep things encoded. ' _They shot him. What do I do?_ ' he knew she would likely say to get out of there, but he wasn't sure if that was an option. Moving Bucky in his state would likely end horribly, and if he tried to get away in his condition and succeeded, there was no telling what would happen to him.

The wait for her reply was agonizing. In reality only a minute or two must have passed, but if felt like time itself had stopped for him. He was worried about her, about Sam, about everything, it felt like. The buzz of the phone in his hand didn't even have time to complete, the message pulled up the second it arrived. ' _Keep him stable. Give him fluids. We'll be there as soon as we can'_. That was easier said than done, but it was all he really could do at this point. He could only hope that they stayed safe and managed to avoid HYDRA. The phone was placed in his pocket as he retrieved a jug of orange juice from the fridge. He thought he remembered something about it helping with blood loss but he wasn't certain. Doing anything other than worry seemed like a good idea right now, so he might as well follow Natasha's advice and try to do some good.

* * *

"You're safe, you're safe…"

The words reached him gradually, spoken softly and warmly as his tentative grip on reality tightened. He felt awful, head swimming and senses dulled. He wanted nothing more than to give in to the lull of sleep, to let go of consciousness and fall back into the waiting darkness, but he knew that would leave him vulnerable. The awareness of his own body was painfully slow to return. He was lying on something soft, his shoulder ached with a pain like broken glass in his head, his mouth was far too dry and something was touching him.

For some odd reason, he wasn't as panicked as he thought he'd be. Concerned was a more accurate word; concerned about what was near him and who was speaking, but the voice was comforting and gentle, and his guard wasn't so quick to build up. It was familiar in some odd way that he couldn't quite put his finger on; it was nothing like the barking orders and fearful murmurs of the white-coated men who pulled him from the icy depths of cryostasis. He couldn't have been in cryo for that matter, he felt too warm for that, and waking from that death-sleep never happened on something soft; he always awoke strapped down on a metal table, alone.

Movement in front of him; someone was standing, walking away. He heard wooden floorboards creak softly underfoot. _Not in the facility_. That was assuring, but also alarming. Where the hell was he, if he wasn't back there? Memories came back in a fuzzy tangle of pain and confusion, not at all clear and providing no answers. All he could definitively pick out was running, running, _running_ , and suffocating pain. It was too much of a jumbled mess to make sense of.

Testing his body was difficult. The pain was sharp enough to register through the programming, indicating that something was damaged severely. His thoughts were too sluggish for him to adequately catalog his own wounds in his mental checklist to relay to his handlers. _Wait—the handlers are dead_. That realization forced his eyes open, mind in desperate need of affirmation for that line of thought. The light, however dim it might have been, was oppressive and overpowering. He blinked several times before he could make out any semblance of detail. The walls were painted a warm, light color, with pictures and furniture scattered around the room. It was nothing like the sterile space he typically woke in. Everything about it was different, but not in an uncomfortable sort of way. He could see a pile of bloody clothes— _mine?_ —off near the door, and was suddenly quite aware of how defenseless he felt.

"… Bucky?" the voice was so sudden it caused him to twitch, body suddenly tense and ready to spring when he caught sight of someone peeking in from a doorway across the room. His vision was still blurry but he thought he recognized him. When the person stepped closer he was sitting up in an instant—and instantly regretted it. The sharp movement caused a burst of warmth on his shoulder, choking down a yelp at the intense pain. He chanced looking away from the man, metal hand cautiously touching the back of his shoulder. The limb lacked tactile sensation, but he did determine there was something spongy and yielding there, and when he removed the hand, the fingers were covered in fresh blood. _My shirt was removed and wounds tended to_. Did the man do this?

The couch, he'd realized he was lying on one a few seconds prior, dipped slightly as the man sat down next to him, keeping enough space between them so he wasn't crowded. The fact that he had approached without him noticing was enough to alarm the asset into immediate guard. He pressed himself against the arm of the couch, back against it and wound as far away from the other as he could get it. He studied him intently, looking for any weapon or any item that was a danger. He was ready to defend himself at the slightest provocation.

"I brought you some juice, if you want something to drink." The man with the bright eyes spoke softly, offering him a clear plastic cup filled about halfway with the liquid, smiling at him with familiarity. It was brightly colored and somewhat unusual looking, but it smelled rather pleasant and his dry throat was suddenly at the forefront of his awareness. The confusion surrounding how he got here was still taking precedence in his mind, but the man, he remembered something about him. His voice was the one that had said he was safe. His hands were faintly stained with blood and his shirt was marred with it as well. _He must be the one who treated me_. He wasn't entirely sure why that thought was comforting, but it was.

Moments passed with no movement between the two, the assassin distrustful and rightfully wary. Kindness and compassion were both incredibly foreign concepts, locked out of him by layers and layers of ridged programming and conditioning. There had to be some reason this man was doing this. Was he being prepped for something?

He swallowed thickly, the dryness of his throat too much to ignore, and cautiously extended his metal hand out to take the offered cup. Eye contact was never broken, not giving the other the chance to do anything that could threaten him. The cup was fragile, thin plastic, and it took a little testing to make sure he wouldn't break it before he took it from him.

"Its orange juice," the man started, "I have milk or water if you'd rather have that?" was he asking for his preference? That was… he didn't really remember any time when anyone had asked what he'd wanted. He didn't respond and regarded the juice warily, but he eventually deemed it safe. It wasn't logical to go through all the effort of tending to his wounds just to poison him. Even with that thought in mind, his first sip was hesitant. It tasted overwhelmingly sweet, enough so that it almost made him gag, but he was so thirsty he probably would have taken just about anything.

"Will you let me look at your shoulder?" the question was entirely unexpected, causing icy eyes to cut over to the other man, "It's bleeding again, and I'd like to get an actual bandage on it, if that's alright with you." He was asking his _permission_. The concept was almost intangible to his methodical mind. He had rarely been told what was happening to him, let alone given anything resembling a choice; when things needed to be done, things were done, and he had no say in them. He was interested in his wellbeing, so perhaps he was a new handler, to replace the ones that were dead.

"One round, sniper rifle, distance of several blocks." He repeated all the information he knew about the injury, "Bullet didn't exit, needs extraction." His voice was monotonous, not looking away from the man at his right. Several moments of silence passed before he watched the other man retrieve several items from the floor before sitting back down next to him, much closer this time. In response the soldier moved, sitting so that his back was to him so he could reach the wound easily. He was operating on programming and instinct, otherwise he never would have turned away from him.

"I'm going to take off the bandage now, let me know if it hurts and I'll stop." His voice was still that gentle tone that held a familiarity that he couldn't place. He didn't respond, just sipping the juice he had been given as he felt the other peel the blood-soaked fabric from the wound. To distract himself he tried to focus on the events that ended with him waking up in this place. He remembered something about the Strike team, about HYDRA, and about desperately seeking out someone.

The asset tensed absentmindedly when he felt the other man dab at the wound with a cloth, wiping away the blood. He heard a hastily mumbled "sorry" from behind him before the work was continued, gentler than before. Minutes passed in silence, with the weapon sitting stilly and obediently as the taller man cleaned and dressed the wound. The disinfectant stung but he didn't show any discomfort, allowing him to clean the wound thoroughly as he let himself be lost in his own thoughts.

A hazy memory trickled into his mind of a cold and dimly-lit apartment, with himself and someone else sitting on a ratty old couch covered in moth-eaten blankets. The other person was scratching the stub of a charcoal pencil into a small sketchbook, bundled up in as many of those pathetic-looking blankets as he could and sitting as close to— _me?_ —as was physically possible. He remembered feeling Steve, his name was Steve, shivering horribly even through all those blankets. It was winter, he'd just gotten over pneumonia, and he remembered how scared he'd been thinking he was going to lose him. But... why did he remember this? Were those memories actually his?

"… you still draw, don't you, Steve?" the soldier suddenly questioned, the degrading programming loosening its grip on his awareness now that he was fully awake. The other man, he remembered his name now. He was Steve Rogers. Captain Steve Rogers. He was the only face he could recall with any clarity, therefore he had to have held some significant importance to him at some time.

"I—" Steve faltered, finishing up wrapping gauze tape around his shoulder to hold the sterile packing in place, "Y-yeah I do, Buck. You… always liked watching me draw." His voice was tentative and hopeful, something the asset made immediate mental note of. He heard Steve putting away things behind him, and he took it as a sign that he was finished.

"… do you still keep a sketchbook?" the assassin wasn't sure why he was so interested, but the memory had been rather clear and he took it as an opportunity to possibly learn if it was real. He tilted his head to glance back over his shoulder, and saw Steve nod slightly. "Can I see it?" he wasn't used to asking questions, to voicing his own thoughts, and he felt a need to try it. Seeing the smile that broke across the other's face was oddly rewarding.

"Of course you can." Steve nearly fumbled over his own words, eyes alight with some emotion he couldn't place, "Here, Bucky." A shirt was held out to him when he turned to face him fully, "Your shirt was ruined, so you can use one of mine." Blue eyes regarded it somewhat warily, but he took it from him regardless. It was little more than a plain grey shirt, but it was appreciated. "I'll go and get you some more juice and my sketchbook. I'll be back in a moment." The empty cup was retrieved from his hand, the assassin not startling at the sudden movement, before the man left the room. _Bucky_. There was that name again. His name. He dimly recalled it—yes, it was his name.

The shirt was a little difficult to put on with his arm and shoulder injured, but it was managed. The horrific grinding and popping of his joint when he pulled it over his head confirmed that the injury had to be set. He added it into his mental list of injuries. The garment was a little big on his thinned frame, but it was clean and comfortable. It had a somewhat familiar scent to it as well that he couldn't quite recall. Even in as much pain as he was, he felt better than he had in a very long time. Not physically better; he felt absolutely awful physically, but maybe a little better mentally.

He had confirmation that his name was the same as the Sergeant memorialized in the museum, and that this other man was the same Steve that he could dimly remember. There was still an odd disconnect between himself and his past, between himself and the man known as Bucky, but this was a fragile thread that tied him back to it. There were a lot of blank, empty spaces where memories should be in his mind, and he doubted he'd ever get everything back, but this felt… right? Being here with Steve felt right. Yes, he was fairly certain this was the right thing to do.

Tired eyes caught sight of a few folded blankets on the floor near his feet. He might have just regained consciousness but he still felt absolutely exhausted and drained. One of the blankets was picked up, wrapped around him tightly to try and block the cold. It was one of those odd constants that never left; cold seemed to follow him like his own shadow, sinking teeth of ice into his flesh every waking moment. No matter what he tried he never could seem to warm himself up. He curled up tightly under the fabric, feeling a tentative safety for the first time in a long while. All the running and fear and paranoia was starting to melt, bit by bit, as he allowed his eyes to close willingly. By the time Steve returned, he had already dozed off, huddled against the arm of the couch with his back to the door; a small, fragile sign of trust. It was the first deep, peaceful sleep he could remember since he woke from stasis.

If only it could have lasted.


	5. Loyalties Long Buried Beneath Code

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the long delay in updates guys! I was dealing with finals and then immediately jumped into summer courses. Updates may not be the old three day gap like they used to, but I'll try my best. This chapter is a tad shorter but fast-paced and hopefully will keep you on the edge of your seat. I had to up the archive warning for graphic and violent depictions, so sorry in advance for that! I hope you're all ready for the worst.

When he opened his eyes this time there was no light, the space dark and silent, the reason for just why he was awake unclear. Several moments passed before he realized he was staring into fabric; the back of a couch, he determined. Unease breathed at the back of his neck, but nothing seemed outwardly wrong around him. However, something still felt _off_. His memories were slow to catch up with his awareness, but he pieced together where he was soon enough. This time his return to consciousness didn't come with any overwhelming paranoia, just a faint acknowledgment of his surroundings; it was a first for the soldier.

He hadn't moved at all since falling asleep, the skill of remaining completely motionless honed into a fine art. It was an ability he'd possessed even before HYDRA's conditioning; he half recalled something about sniping. The downside was that he was now rather sore, and he was sure the injuries he'd sustained earlier in the night had only been compounded by his lack of movement. He'd slept on his right arm, which hadn't done his dislocated joint any favors. He would be sure to alert his new handler to the injury come morning.

There was a momentary lapse before he corrected his thought. _Not handler, Steve_. The man was an odd sort of mystery in his head. He wasn't a handler, wasn't a white-coated tech, wasn't anything he was familiar with. Steve was _Steve_. He was a strange exception in a world of ridged rules and protocols. Normally such an obvious outlier would make him nervous, but Steve's presence was comforting and nonthreatening and achingly familiar.

Movement was difficult; now that the adrenaline and shock had worn off he felt the full force of the pain. Every muscle seemed to ache, a deep-seeded burn that spread from his skin to the deepest parts of him. His prosthetic creaked and the servos whined pitifully, the weeks of abuse and ill-care wearing at it. Getting into a sitting position took much more effort than he expected, but now that he had a clear view of the entire room he felt a little safer. The tentative feeling of security let him will himself to take stock of his situation.

The room hadn't changed except for the light having been flipped off, but the darkness was of no hindrance. He could see rather well at night, but whether or not that was inherent or due to HYDRA tampering he wasn't sure. Despite the fact that this place exuded a sense of safety that he'd never experienced before, checking the perimeter and his surroundings was so ingrained in him that he felt a compulsion to do it.

As he moved to get up, he noticed there was a second blanket covering him. Or had been, before he sat up and caused it to tumble off of him in a heap. Absentmindedly he reached out to pick it up, wincing a bit at the metallic whine of his artificial joints and tendons. Several of the plates were jarred out of place, clanking together unnaturally and restricting his range of motion. Dried blood mired the reflective surface, coming not from himself but from nameless HYDRA agents. As soon as he had recovered enough to be effective, he had gone and destroyed every safe house he knew of, killing every HYDRA agent he came across. He was going to destroy HYDRA all on his own if it came to that; they were going to regret ever having created him. He'd see to it.

"Mm, Buck?" the sleepy hum of the Captain broke the silence, the soldier's eyes cutting over in that direction. He hadn't even noticed the other man had placed himself in a nearby chair, now-open eyes regarding him tiredly. _Keeping an eye on me? Making sure I don't escape?_ The second thought made his brow furrow a bit. _No, that's not right_. He somehow just knew that wasn't why he had opted to rest out here instead of returning to the bedroom.

The asset didn't respond verbally, but gave him a brief nod before he carried through with picking up the blanket. The nervousness was once again settling into the pit of his stomach, the sort of feeling he expected prey felt before a predator sprung from the shadows. It was such an unfamiliar feeling, as he was usually the lurking predator in question. He could hear Steve stretching and moving to get up, so he decided to remain seated; he had a feeling the Captain would fuss if he tried to get up and walk with his wounds.

"Feeling any better?" the other's voice was far too bright for it being so early in the morning. The assassin just watched as he tapped at a phone, glancing to him after the screen lit up. He took a moment to check himself mentally before he responded. His metal fingers hesitantly relinquished their grip on the blanket, instead wrapping gingerly around his shoulder joint, where the Captain had dislocated it in their struggle.

"… arm hurts." He mumbled quietly, lacking the robotic, monotonous quality that had previously dominated his voice. He knew that the Captain had seen the deep bruising and discoloration around the joint, as the bullet wound was plastered in the middle of it, but he was well aware that there was likely little he could do for it. Even he wasn't sure if it was just a dislocation, or if there was a fracture as well. The frown that appeared on the other man's face at his words was enough to make the nervousness he was experiencing leap to the front of his mind.

"We'll get it looked at, don't worry." His voice was always so soothing, "But…" discomfort, possibly even fear crept into the other's tone suddenly, serving to heighten the soldier's apprehension. His gaze was at his phone again, tapping his finger against it nervously. "… we can't stay here, we need to get somewhere safe." The sense of urgency was contagious, it seemed. The hairs on the back of his neck were on-end again, and the assassin was on his feet in a few seconds.

"Buck, are you sure you're alright to be up and—"the glare he directed at the Captain was much more threatening than he meant it to be, but he got his point across as the rest of the man's sentence withered in his throat. He wasn't fragile, he wasn't to be coddled; he was a weapon that was damaged and malfunctioning, not broken and useless. Weakness wasn't tolerated, his handlers had made sure to drive that into his programming.

"Give me a minute to get ready and get you a jacket, then we've gotta move out." Those were words the soldier remembered and associated with. _Location compromised, moving to safety_. It must be why he woke up; HYDRA must be closing in. It was enough to make his muscles stiffen with readiness, not wanting to be taken by surprise like last time. They wouldn't have that luxury. Not again.

Waiting was not in the Winter Soldier's repertoire, and instead of remaining still he was up and moving. The pistol he had dropped earlier was retrieved, inspected and placed into his pocket. There wasn't a lot of ammunition left in it, but enough to be useful. He'd done more damage with much, much less. Now that he was up he decided to do that perimeter check he'd been planning on. Steve was doing something in his room, so he avoided that room and checked every other one. His pass through the kitchen produced the knife he'd left that first night, still sullied with the Captain's blood, and a worn sketchbook. There was a twinge of guilt in his stomach that passed quickly as he placed the blade back into the sheath at his ankle. The small book, likely the one Steve had been bringing to show him, was tucked into his pocket.

The dull, aching burn in his muscles was pushed out of his awareness; now that there was a clear threat to him all pain was ignored. It was how he had been conditioned, trained and taught; pain was a weakness and only useful for determining damage after a successful mission. He hated to admit that he was nervous, but he was. He had the beginnings of fragile trust in Steve, but this had the makings of a trap. Suddenly relocating after arriving? Departing hours before the sun rose, when no one would ever notice their passing? It was enough to set off warning bells in the soldier's mind.

"Buck," the Captain's hesitant voice broke his thoughts, eyes cutting over to where the other man was peeking in from the door, "Are you ready?" again with questions, again with asking him things. It was still a strange and unusual concept to the asset, used only to demands and orders. He responded only with a curt nod, taking a jacket that the other offered to him. It was somewhat big on him, but worn and soft and comfortable nonetheless. Nothing like the rigid combat gear HYDRA had outfitted him with. In a way he felt vulnerable, missing the reassuring weight and constriction of his body armor.

Steve had a small pack slung over his shoulder, the contents of which the soldier didn't know, and shield strapped to his arm. It was clear, however, that they were likely not coming back, not for a long time at least. There was no sentimental attachment to this place for him, he didn't have any sentimental attachments honestly, but he did know this place and knew it was safe in his mind, so leaving it didn't sit right in his mind. He did know, however, that staying would end in certain HYDRA custody or death.

Ushered out into the hall, the soldier only moved when prompted by his new handler. _No, Steve_. His senses were on alert, although still dulled and sluggish from the blood loss earlier. The sleep and bandaging had improved his awareness a bit, although even with his serum it would take a few more hours before he would be in a condition he was comfortable with. He just watched as Steve tapped at his phone, door pulled shut behind him. It was only after he read some text message for the fifth time that he suddenly froze.

"Shit." Now that got a reaction out of the soldier. He tensed up and stood perfectly still, the tone of Steve's voice setting off warnings and alarm bells that something was catastrophically wrong. His tone had been nothing but softness and warmth up until now; the swear sparked just the ghost of a sensation in his head, of cold wind and the smell of gunsmoke as he peered over a trench in some long forgotten battlefield.

"We need to move. _Now_." the words spilled out of the blond man suddenly, a hand grabbing his right arm without warning and tugging him down towards the stairs. Normally such an unexpected action would have warranted a swift punch to the jaw, but the startled tone in the other's voice alerted him that something was very, _very_ wrong. He didn't resist, letting Steve lead him swiftly down the stairs and towards a back door, the other man mumbling the entire way about something about the text having been wrong. Muffled voices— _HYDRA, Strike team_ —filtered through the walls from outside, formless shadows visible through the frosted glass of the front doors.

Subtly was thrown out the window as Steve kicked the back door open and bolted outside, the asset stumbling and fighting to keep up with the jolting motion. The man had yet to let go of his arm, guiding him through narrow alleyways and side streets in a path that seemed predetermined. He didn't know the plan, which was a source of anxiety in and of itself, but Steve clearly had something in mind, so for the first time he—trust was too strong a word— _relied_ on the other's decisions to get them out of harm's way.

HYDRA agents were all over, dressed in varying uniforms of Strike and police and others he did not recognize. They shouted as they tried to corner them, seemingly appearing from nowhere from alleyways and cars and from behind objects. Steve did not engage them, instead pulling him along as he ducked and weaved dizzyingly between buildings and sleepy streets. He had a set destination in mind, the asset could tell, and even though the sight of HYDRA angered him into considering pulling away to fight, he knew it was too risky to separate himself from the Captain.

Unfortunately, HYDRA did that for him. There was a sudden, jarring shout from one of the alleys they were about to blow past, and before either could react the darkened space filled with blinding light and a concussive sound. _Flashbang_. Steve yelled something but the asset didn't hear, the grip on his arm lost as the other covered his ears. Even before the white left his vision, formless shapes surrounded them as agents appeared to spring from the very walls to box them in. Wordlessly, the assassin and the Avenger stood back to back, fitting into formation as easily as if it was something they did every day. The pistol was pulled from his pocket, knowing that even with little ammo it would be more effective at the moment than a knife. There was a brief flash of familiarity in his mind, but the situation around him drowned it out almost instantly.

"Drop your weapon and surrender the asset, Captain Rogers!" a husky voice barked out, a dozen barrels of a dozen guns aimed at them. He could feel Steve tense against his back, but so vastly outnumbered and outgunned any outburst now would likely end in one or both of them dead.

"… Steve." He wasn't sure just why he spoke, or why his voice was softened and hinted with an accent he only vaguely recalled, but he did. It was a sort of rash, sudden need to ground himself in the present, to remind himself that the man behind him was indeed the Steve he could so faintly remember. His statement, however, had an unintended consequence.

"The asset's compromised," that growling voice spoke again, "he'll need to be wiped and reconditioned if we're going to salvage this." That statement triggered an intense, shattering terror in the assassin the likes of which he could not recall. Broken memories of deafening electricity crackling madly, of being tied down and unresisting and passive, suddenly swam in his mind and broke through his calculating combat mindset. Without thought he pressed himself further against Steve's back, as if somehow he could hide from his own horrifying memories in the other's presence.

"Buck, it's alright," voice hushed and gentle, the Captain spoke only loud enough for him to hear, "You've got to work with me, we're going to work together to get out of this, just follow my lead." It wasn't worded as an order or command, and as such disoriented the soldier for a moment, but that fragile ideal of trust settled in to fill in the gaps and his only response was a slight nod that went unseen. They could do this.

There was no warning for the HYDRA agents, shield thrown and colliding with several and incapacitating them while three expertly placed and near-simultaneous bullets downed three permanently. They moved in sync, still keeping each at their back even after separating and lunging at the ring of agents that surrounded them. The now-useless pistol had been abandoned in favor for a blade, which was used to swiftly and efficiently disable and kill two more agents before they could even fire off a round.

The resonant _clang_ of the shield behind him let him subconsciously track the Captain's movements, even as he threw himself into the tangle of agents in front of him. He used the knowledge that he was wanted alive to his advantage, as he knew they wouldn't dare try to shoot him at such close range as it would likely irreparably damage him and they would lose their prized asset. It couldn't have worked better for him, as he was just as comfortable and deadly dispatching a target at close range as he was sniping.

An agent was slammed against the nearby wall, razored blade deftly sliding between neck vertebras to kill his target instantly. Without a moment's hesitation he was upon another, moving with all the predatory grace of a hunting cat, throat slit and body casually dropped as if it were little more than a discarded jacket. The remaining two agents in his field of view turned and bolted, and had he been on his prior missions of annihilating HYDRA installations around the city he would have pursued them relentlessly, but now he barely acknowledged their escape. Instead, he spun on his heel to where Steve was fighting, wasting no time engaging the remaining agents that swarmed him.

His blood-sullied blade dipped into the throat of a Strike member readying to shoot Steve's back, a gurgled wheeze of horrified shock the only noise that escaped before he was roughly shoved aside. Sticky crimson soaked deep into his jacket and clothes beneath but little regard was given to it; the horrors of his actions seemed as commonplace as any daily act to him after decades of repetition. Another HYDRA infantrymen lunged at Rogers with a stun baton, but the soldier intercepted him, slashing with a precise stroke that opened the man's torso as easily as a zipper. He fell noiselessly into a jumbled heap of blood and viscera at the Captain's feet, a non-threat.

Soon only a few hostiles remained, mostly stepping far back and firing as many rounds as they could at Captain Rogers. The asset refused to leave the man's side again, tucked up close near him in an effort to deter any more firing, and to his dim surprise it seemed to work. The agents backed away even farther, guns raised but triggers untouched, eyes locked on them. He took the brief lull in fire to glance at Steve for a moment, to assess his condition. He was on his feet, but blood had soaked his right leg from a bullet wound to the calf. A slash from a knife tore through his jacket and into his side, while red dribbled from his saturated sleeve from another entry wound. He was standing, for the moment, but the soldier knew that even with the serum the blood loss would catch him quickly.

Steve asked something, something about how he was holding up or the like, but the assassin didn't catch it. Instead his attention was elsewhere when his eyes caught a brief flash of light from the roof of a building two streets over. His heart fell into his stomach and his shout of warning was lost to the rifle crack when the realization hit. Of course, the bullet hit first, just not in the place HYDRA had wanted it.

The soldier had reacted instinctively, kicking the back of Steve's injured leg hard enough that he buckled. His sudden movement meant the bullet, aimed for a kill shot on the Avenger's heart, instead struck and slid off the slant of his shield and hit his collarbone. A second bullet, fired milliseconds after the first from a likely second sniper, caught him across his already-slashed ribs, blossoming open as if it were a grotesque flower. The strangled cry of shock and pain that left the man as he crumpled to the ground snapped something buried deep beneath HYDRA programming, and within a half-second he had grabbed Steve by his arm and pulled him into a small alcove between two buildings. He heard two more bullets strike the asphalt where they had been moments before, and knew that HYDRA was likely not going to take Steve alive.

All thoughts of the remaining HYDRA agents were abandoned at the sound of Steve's raspy breathing, the assassin leaning him against the building wall as to hopefully ease it some as he leaned down to his level. Even though the shield had absorbed most of the energy of the round, the wound was devastating. The bullet had shattered his collarbone, flesh torn and ripped and blood dripping freely. A dribble of the crimson stained the Captain's chin, breath labored and choking and heaved in and out. _His lung's been punctured, probably collapsing_. The second bullet had no doubt shattered his ribs, and the awful torn wound was jagged and blown apart by the unimpeded bullet's passing. It was a grim prognosis.

The sounds of the agents trying to regroup from the attack were hardly registered, hands pressed to the man's injury in a desperate attempt to stem the flow of blood. A pained cough escaped him, reddened mouth slackened open as he tried again and again to fill his lungs full to no avail. "B… B-Buck…" he slurred wetly through the blood, half-lidded eyes beginning to glaze over as unconsciousness loomed, "… got t-to… get… a-away…" shock was setting in, body trembling under the assassin's hands, but he mustered the energy to nudge him with the shield in a halfhearted attempt to push him into running. He wanted him to leave him behind, to save himself from falling back into HYDRA's control. The very thought of it twisted the soldier's stomach in a knot and caused his breath to catch in his throat.

"S-Steve," his normally-controlled voice was shaky and small, fear filling every inch of him as trembling, blood-stained metallic fingers brushed golden hair away and cupped the Captain's cheek to hold his gaze on him, "You've gotta hold on," his eyes began to sting as an unfamiliar heat and blurriness began to build, "I-I'm not leaving you behind." Something had woken up deep in his mind, faint ghosts of memories of battles long past. Of fights in alleys where both refused to run away, never leaving the other's side. It was such a strong emotion that consumed him that he couldn't ever hope to fight it, and strangely enough, he possessed no will to resist it.

Footsteps and barked orders behind him drew him from his withdrawn, focused state. It was like a switch flicking in his head, the sharp focus of combat and programming setting in, and within the space of a breath he had taken the shield from Steve's faltering grasp and spun around, keeping himself between the agents and his injured partner. His vision was blurred and his eyes stung fiercely, an unfamiliar wetness trailing down a cheek, but he didn't move from his defensive stance, rooted to the spot with shield held solid in his metal prosthetic. The plates whirled and slid together with a groan of protest, ready to lash out with the vibranium disk at the slightest movement.

"Get away!" he snarled in a voice so loud it startled the men, "Get away from him!" he swung the shield at an agent that dared to approach, knocking him clean off his feet and sending him tumbling. The sharp, ripping pain as his own shoulder wound tore caused him to wince, but it was immediately stuffed down as he had much more important things to focus on. Seeing their own knocked away so easily, even while he was in such a state, caused the others to take heed and back away a few feet. Even though his joint protested, he retrieved and hid a blade in the palm of his injured arm, keeping it disguised behind the shield. If they got close again they would be in for a nasty surprise.

"This is… unexpected." The same agent who spoke earlier piped up, rifle trained on the pair with deadly intent, "Looks like the programming has decayed more than anticipated. General Lukin isn't going to be pleased." That name was familiar, and struck a fear like a dagger of ice into the soldier's heart. He pressed himself back, shield held higher in a desperate attempt to keep the agents at bay. Steve moved behind him, whimpering in pain, and a moment later the former Soviet felt his hand press reassuringly to his back in a wordless gesture of trust. It was enough to steel his nerves, to dispel his own fear just enough to focus on the agents who had chanced to venture further.

With an almost animalistic roar, he leapt at the nearest agent, jamming the sharp edge of the shield into his ribcage, crushing it like a flimsy can. He dropped into a tangle of limbs, and he used the moment of confusion to swing at another, feeling the agent's skull cave under the impact. The shield was brought down on the neck of another agent, while the knife in his right hand pierced the torso of one rushing at him. As he swiveled to lunge at the seeming-commander he froze mid-strike, eyes wide with terror, when he saw that another agent had a gun trained to the downed Captain's head.

"No!" the word clawed its way out of him, shield and blade falling from his hand in a show of submission, eyes wide with feral panic. "D-don't do it." He'd never demanded anything from anyone, not in all his active years, but he was now. He was scared, desperate and out of options, pleading like one of his victims to spare the other man's life. The commander's gravelly voice broke into a laugh behind him, but before he could round on him he felt a pinprick on the back of his neck, followed immediately by a burst of warmth that spider-webbed through his body. His knees buckled and vision swam, awareness growing fuzzy as he collapsed to the ground. He gasped out Steve's name, tried to push himself back up, but he couldn't even prevent his eyes from sliding shut a heartbeat later. His hearing muffled, but the last thing he was aware of was that growl of a voice ordering the surviving agents to take the both of them before everything drained away into nothingness.


	6. Battle-Tested, Unbroken Bonds of Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry this took so long. This chapter was really difficult to write, as its the intro to the upcoming arc of this fic so it was kinda clunky and difficult to get the groundwork out. It's a smidge shorter than normal, but I hope you like it anyway! As always your comments are greatly appreciated and make it all worthwhile. <3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning- some mentions of needles, blood, gore and whatnot, so if those bother you please take care! Also you're finally getting a hint of the 'fluff' part of the angst and fluff tag in this chapter

Habit and impulse were so easy to fall back on, thinking being a costly and dangerous liability. The Asset had learned that early on, it having been forced into his program, carved into his skin among the patchwork of scars so it became a part of him. This time, however, this time it was _different_. This time when he woke up on that familiar cold table, seeing white-coated techs hovering over him and his wounds like vultures, he didn't feel the programming trying to lull him into docility. Oh no, this time a latent instinct, old and raw and powerful, bubbled through the cracks in HYDRA's conditioning and screamed in his subconscious, spurring him to act.

_Fight, find,_ _**protect** _

A snarl worthy of a predator tore its way out of his throat as he shoved the nearest tech away, the force of it throwing him clear into the opposite wall. The rest of them scattered like insects, shouting in varied languages as he pulled himself into a sitting position, glaring at them from behind the mess of his hair. A half-dozen IVs were laced into his veins, a likely but ultimately unsuccessful attempt to keep him asleep. The stiffness along his shoulder told him they had likely closed the sniper's wound, and he quickly realized his dislocated joint had been pushed back into place and immobilized with thick medical tape. They'd replaced his blood-soaked shirt with a dark grey one, and as if to mock him, it bore the SHIELD logo embossed in shiny blue thread over his heart.

"где." The soldier demanded, forcing himself to his feet, the drip-lines tugged free of his arms. The HYDRA agents and techs skittered in panic, yowling like panicked animals in a hunter's trap. When he didn't get a response did he bark the word out again, this time in English. "Where." If he wasn't told, he wouldn't hesitate to tear the place to shreds to find out. Before any of the cowardly technicians could answer, however, several HYDRA agents in full combat gear poured into the room, armed to the teeth.

One moved too close, holding a syringe, and the assassin lunged without hesitation. His metal arm felt sluggish and heavy, having been in the middle of being repaired when he woke, but that didn't hinder his deadliness any as he swung with all the force he could muster at the man's jaw. A grim sort of smirk appeared on his features, feeling bone crack and give under his fist, the soldier dropping into a crumpled heap at his feet. He crushed the dropped syringe under his boot, the sound of the glass shattering morbidly satisfying.

Something was shouted in a language he couldn't catch, but he didn't give the soldiers the luxury of time to coordinate themselves. A scalpel, lifted from the near table that held the medical supplies, in his capable hands slit the throat of one of the agents before he even realized what had happened, the bleeding man roughly kicked away into another soldier. Another's throat was caught in his metal fingers when he went to prod him with a stunstick, the vertebra crunching loudly with a single squeeze. The body was casually tossed aside, a mere afterthought. Chaos erupted, which was exactly what the Asset had wanted, as he was able to easily dispatch agent after agent, until in the confusion he was able to slip out into the hall. He slammed the door shut behind him, bending the metal frame enough that the soldiers inside weren't getting out anytime soon.

Alarms began to blare, and he knew he didn't have much time. He needed to find where they were keeping Steve, needed to find out if he was alive, _needed to get him out_. The layout of the building was familiar, and he soon found himself tracing mental maps that he couldn't consciously remember. Identical doors in identical halls, yet somehow he knew the way, ending up in a neglected corner of whatever backwater HYDRA base this was. _Detention level_. He knew these rooms all too well. Broken memories of conditioning, of training and discipline flashed through his mind. It was enough to sour his stomach.

Only one of the rooms had light filtering through the dingy door window, and he just knew that had to be where they were keeping Steve. The door was thick steel, reinforced and heavy and bolted with more locks than he cared to count. It could have been made of vibranium and it wouldn't have been enough to keep him out. The Asset tore through the locks he could, picking the others he couldn't, using every skill in his considerable arsenal but his patience only lasted so long. Normally he could wait for days, one of a sniper's greatest attributes, but this was Steve and he needed inside _now_.

The sound of metal rending and groaning filled the level, the soldier slamming his metallic fist into the door over and over, bending and deforming the surface bit by bit. The servos and artificial tendons in his arm screamed in protest but he scarcely cared, eventually making a dent deep enough he could get his fingers inside the stop. He braced himself and pulled with all his weight, the fatigued and aged metal shredding in his hand. That just fed his ambition, and soon enough he was tearing through the door with both hands, unfeeling to the shards that sliced through his flesh and bone hand, and to the hot slickness of blood as it poured from his palm.

Desperation was beginning to claw at his mind. He knew agents would find out where he was soon enough, and he couldn't let them take him away. Not before he knew if Steve was still alive. Standing back, the assassin kicked the door with every ounce of strength he had. The metal gave way with a great resounding shudder, the hinges failing and door swinging open violently. He was inside before the door even had the chance to hit the wall when it swung wide.

Relief isn't anywhere near strong enough a word to convey the emotion the soldier felt when he saw Steve, battered and broken and still as he was, breathing and alive. At his side in an instant, the assassin assessed the Captain's condition and wounds within moments. The man was unconscious, the worst of his wounds hidden under layers and layers of pink-tinged gauze. Smaller injuries had been ignored, his skin was pallor and in some distant part of his mind the soldier recognized this. Recognized a tiny kid with a rattling cough and pale skin who always scared him half to death with the fact that he might not make it through winter.

Medical supplies still covered the table to the side of the cot he was placed on, and without a second thought or any concern for being captured, the former Soviet started to pick through the contents. He wrapped a quick bandage around the cuts to his hand to stem the bleeding, not wanting to risk getting it on Steve when who knew what had been pumped into his system. Clean gauze was soaked in disinfectant, the excess wrung out before it was pressed to a shallow cut that burned an angry red across the Captain's cheek. The serum had already begun healing his body, the wound already mostly closed, but for some reason he found himself fussing over it regardless.

The soldier hadn't patched anyone up save himself for decades. He remembered, very dimly, bandaging someone with crimson hair that glowed like a dying fire, but the memory was so hazy and distorted that it might as well have been a dream. He was used to sewing himself up, to prying bullets out of his body and mending jagged pieces of flesh back together. As a result, delicateness was not something he was intimately familiar with, yet it seemed his body remembered better than his brain, as he cleaned the man's wounds with an unfamiliar tender gentleness.

A crackle of memory fizzled in his mind, of him sitting in a muddy, snow-filled trench, tearing a scarf free of his neck and brandishing it as if to threaten some other person. He dimly recalled blood, from a wound of some kind to the arm of someone dressed in blue, and angrily muttering something about not signing up to be a mother as he wrapped his scarf around the limb. He remembered laughter from people he didn't know, or couldn't remember, and being called a jerk. The memory faded as quickly as it appeared, and within a second of its passing it was all but forgotten in favor of focusing on the task at hand.

"Well, seems like the dosage of sedative we gave you was a bit off." A calm voice suddenly broke the silence, the assassin's muscles seizing up in remembered fear as familiarity crashed over him like a wave. He didn't move for a long moment, bloody fingers hovering over another cut to the Avenger's chin, as if his stillness could be taken as a sign of submission.

There was an amused hum from behind him, one that faded into a dark, twisted sort of laugh. "At attention, воин." The order was issued sternly, and the soldier found himself turning around to face the man, posture stiff with unease and the beginnings of fear. The man, he knew him, the name Lukin provided by the bits of memory that survived each successive wipe. A crooked grin spread across the General's face and it caused the Asset's stomach to churn.

"They warned me that you were far more… _damaged_ than we would have liked." Lukin spoke with all the casualness as if they were merely speaking about the weather, "It would have been easier just to put you down, but since we have Captain America in addition to our Winter Soldier…" he trailed off, malevolent smile spreading further across his face as he approached with a proud air to his movements. Once he was close enough, the suited man regarded him with all the affection one might have for a fine weapon, eyes appraising but cold and calculating, seeking only value.

"Why, I think what's left of SHIELD would do just about anything to get their hands on him, and you as well. Oh, the secrets they think you have… they'd do anything to wring them out of you, воин, but I'm never going to let that happen, don't you worry." The acidic sweetness to his voice made the soldier's blood run as cold as the river that haunted his nightmares. It was a tone all too familiar, yet for what felt like lifetimes that tone had been the closest semblance to kindness he'd ever experienced, and he'd latched onto it desperately. Now it made him sick.

Lukin brushed past him, leaning over the cot to look at the Captain's wounds. One of his hands reached out, and the soldier let out a growl that faded into a whine at the glare he received. The man's hand remained raised with a hint of threatening intent, and the assassin felt his muscles tense in the expectation of a blow. His programming might have degraded greatly due to being so long out of cryostasis, but enough of the framework was intact for him to not attack the man or outwardly resist his commands. He could only watch as he withdrew his hand, walking back towards the shattered door, his back to him.

"I see you have some… _attachment_ to the Captain." The General's tone held the slightest hint of bitterness, something he knew was very dangerous, "That will not be tolerated. However…" his voice went quiet, that knowing smirk once again firmly planted on his features as he spun on his heel to face the soldier, "If you cooperate and let us fix all that damage Captain Rogers and his SHIELD allies have done to your mind, we might let him live. If you don't have any more of those outbursts, we might even let you see him." It was a ruse, he knew it for sure, but he had no choice but to nod in silent agreement. Arguing would signal that HYDRA's control had faltered dangerously, and he couldn't risk Steve's safety. For the first time in his memory, he found himself putting the well-being of another before his own.

"Good, good. In that case I expect you to return to medical immediately and let the doctors finish up their work. We need you in working order as soon as possible. I expect an update on your condition in three hours." With that, Lukin left the room. The soldier's hearing could pick up on the sound of footsteps running down the hall to retrieve him, likely signaled by the General, and he only had a few seconds. He couldn't run, couldn't try to fight or escape, as that would get Steve killed and he couldn't bring himself to even consider that possibility.

He'd have to play this game, even fall back under HYDRA's command if it meant keeping the other man alive. It was a sacrifice he was willing to make. The soldiers crowded the room a half-second later, surrounding him and shepherding him out and away from the room, away from Steve. One of them fit the muzzle-mask over his face, and with its acquainted confines the soldier felt a foreign sense of revulsion budding in his chest. The familiarity of it all, and the horror that he found himself so easily slipping back into the mannerisms and routine, made the new fear that he might lose what little fragments of himself he'd managed to gain back seem very, very real.

* * *

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

The soft, rhythmic pattern of water drops pulled Steve out of the fog of unconsciousness, cutting through the static that seemed to fill his mind. He didn't feel any pain, not yet, but he felt heavy and weak and so very tired. Stagnant, stale air coated his throat, thick with a sharp, sanitized scent that settled on his tongue with a faintly bitter, familiar taste. The air itself felt dense, as if he was breathing through cotton shoved down his throat; if he hadn't known better, he would have thought he was having an asthma attack. There was a rattling, ghastly wheeze every handful of seconds in addition to the dripping that had woken him, and it took a long, sobering moment before he realized that he was hearing his own breathing.

_Drip._

_Drip._

His torso felt constricted, tight and immobile under what felt like a cocoon of gauze and medical tape. As uncomfortable as it was it assured him that his wounds had been tended to, but by whom the Captain had no idea. An experimental twitch of his fingers assured him that he wasn't paralyzed and could move, however difficult it may have been. Everything felt fuzzy, it was the only way to describe it, unable to feel or hear anything clearly. Everything was blurred into a mess of muffled noises and sweeping sensations, nothing distinct.

_Drip._

A slight shift of his head told him just how stiff and sore his neck was. _How long was I out?_ The thought struck him suddenly, followed immediately by the cold electricity of fear. _Where am I?_ His eyes were forced open, but shut immediately due to the blinding light of the room. Steve groaned and squeezed his eyes shut tighter, tilting his head trying to block out every bit of that painful brightness. The movement made him aware that his head was propped up slightly, a pillow tucked behind it. It reminded him of when he'd have respiratory infections in winter and Bucky would give him all the pillows to keep his head and shoulders lifted so he could breathe easier—

_Bucky._

The panic that gripped him was all-consuming, shredding through the muddled fog in his mind like iron claws. "B-Buck…" the word barely left his throat, voice hoarse and rasping and lungs suddenly alight with crackling fire at the effort. The words brought the taste of copper to his lips, blood he was sure, but he scarcely cared. "B… Bucky!" His eyes shot open again, ignoring the pain of the light and he looked frantically for any sign of the soldier. Everything came crashing back in a tangle of bloody memories—the fight, the sniper, Bucky collapsing in front of him, felled by the commander—and in horror he realized they had been captured. His own pain was ignored as he tried to push himself up, the room spinning as he did so, his own weakness now undeniably apparent.

A strong, cold hand gripped his shoulder, pushing him back down onto the cot before he could even think of trying to search. Moments later a figure moved into his vision, leaning over him with a face obscured by a curtain of dark, unruly hair. He heard a hushed word of Russian, tone soft, reassuring in its sound although he didn't understand it. The Captain's vision was too blurry to see many details, but then again, he didn't need any details to recognize him.

A dozen words tried to spill out of him at once— _you're alright, you're here, I was so scared for you, Buck_ — but nothing left him save a wheezy exhale as he smiled in relief. He wanted to stand, to make sure Bucky was alright, to tend to any wounds he had, but he was all too aware that he couldn't do a damned thing in this state. Bucky was here and in the end that was the most important thing. Everything else could be confronted and dealt with later.

Without another thought Steve had raised his left arm, hesitantly brushing a few stray strands of hair out of the way before cupping his cheek. He wanted to make sure he was really there, that this wasn't some horrible HYDRA trick, that it wasn't the blood loss and whatever medicines he was full of making him see things. Bucky's skin was cold, rough against his fingers, but very much alive and very much real. He didn't even try to stop his smile from spreading a bit when he saw how the soldier leaned into the touch a bit instead of shying away or swatting at his hand.

"… 'bout time you woke up." Bucky's voice was quiet and scratchy, just the barest hint of a Brooklyn accent shining through as he moved away, turning to look at what Steve guessed was the door. He let his hand fall back to his side, cringing a bit when he felt a tug at the crook of his arm. _IV line; must have been what the dripping was_. He tried to ask how long he'd been out but only managed to cough, tacky blood rattling in his aching lungs. The soldier glanced down to him at the sound, but quickly went back to his vigil.

"Three days," of course he'd have been able to know what he was trying to say, they'd been able to finish each other sentences in the past, "you were hurt bad, Steve, real bad. Still hurt bad, but I won't let them touch you." His voice trailed off, words carrying an edge as sharp as any blade, but also the barest hint of sadness. It was the most Bucky had spoken to him since he found him sleeping seemingly lifetimes ago, and in some distant part of the Captain his soul practically sung. He sounded more like Bucky, more like the cocky jerk he'd grown up with in Brooklyn than he ever had since he'd become the Winter Soldier. A second later just what he had said sunk in, and his optimism wavered.

"… w-who?" the Avenger just barely croaked it out, a sense of dread sitting heavy in his heart. He knew who had captured them, knew where they were, but maybe he could deny it all away. After all, Bucky was here with him, right? _They_ would have separated them for sure—

"HYDRA." The name was spat out, deadly venom saturating his voice. Steve's blood ran cold in his veins, the room falling silent with only the constant _drip drip_ of the isotonic IV bag keeping time between them with its ceaseless rhythm. That little bit of hope that he had been clinging to wavered, knowing just how bad a situation they were in, but it didn't go out. Natasha and Sam were still out there, and he knew they wouldn't give up on him. They'd find them, somehow; Natasha was clever and resourceful, she'd pick up the trail and find them, and Sam was loyal and wouldn't stop until he was found.

His lungs hurt too much to try and continue the conversation, and as his eyes adjusted he tried to make sense of his surroundings. The measly cot he was lying on was pushed against a stone wall that just seemed to exude a wet chill, meaning they were likely somewhere underground. Light buzzed blearily from a thin fluorescent fixture in the ceiling, a pitchy and irritating hum occasionally creeping over the _drip drop_ of the IV. The walls were dingy and ill-kempt, but a glance to the door surprised him. Door was a loose term as it looked like it had been holding back a tiger, shattered glass and broken old steel littering the floor, but the door itself was made of new shiny metal. Judging from the debris, the damaged door he was currently looking at was a replacement and the first one made up the scraps on the floor. It took a few seconds before Steve realized it wasn't from Bucky attempting to break out, but from him _breaking in_.

That realization made his chest tighten, breath hitching slightly as he tried to breathe around the lump that built in his throat. His last hazy moments of consciousness in that alleyway, of Bucky crouched in front of him teary-eyed with gentling hands pressed to his wounds, he'd thought he had dreamed them. Thought that in his pained delirium he'd imagined hearing the soldier's meek voice saying _"I'm not leaving you behind"._ Thought that maybe he'd mistaken seeing Bucky breaking through for those precious few minutes, and it looks like he just might have. He'd clearly torn his way out of wherever HYDRA had tried to lock him up, but instead of making an escape, he found him and broke _in_ and stayed right by his side.

"Y-you… stayed with m-me…" Steve's voice was hardly above a raspy whisper, vision distorting as tears welled up. He wasn't sure if it was the pain or medicine or just a moment of vulnerability that brought them out, but he didn't make any attempts to hide them. _Bucky protected me_. He'd fought to keep HYDRA away from _him_ instead of saving himself. Even if Buck didn't remember much of his past he had still fought to keep him safe like all those years ago. The Avenger breathed heavily, choking on his own words as he tried to say too many things at once. He knew this man wasn't the Bucky he knew so well from his past, but he was bits and pieces of him and he wasn't going to stop helping him even if the suave jerk he had spent his life with never really came back.

"Quit that," Bucky's voice was gruff, but the fingers that hesitantly ruffled his hair a moment later were gentle and familiar, "You're gonna tear that lung again if you keep talkin'. Get some more sleep, I'll be here when you wake up." It wasn't a command from the Winter Soldier, it was spoken too softly for that, instead it sounded more like back in their apartment in the old days, when Bucky would try to wrangle him to bed when he was sick and not cooperating. He couldn't count how many times Buck had just picked up all coughing hundred and ten pounds of him and put him to bed under every moth-eaten blanket they owned, no matter how much Steve protested. He never admitted it to him, but after his mom had died, Bucky's sometimes over-protective mollycoddling had meant the world to him.

Bucky continued to run his fingers through Steve's hair, something he'd done countless times when the artist had been sick and confined to Buck's bed. The radiator in Steve's old room had always had piss-poor timing when it came to breaking, so whenever he had shown the slightest sign of illness Buck had surrendered his much-warmer room and they both slept curled up on that ratty old bed to try and keep warm. He wasn't sure if Bucky remembered any of that or if he was just acting on instinct or something else, but just like it had back then in their apartment, it put the Captain to sleep in only a few minutes.

With him lulled back into sleep so quickly, he hadn't had the time to notice that Bucky was dressed back into his combat gear, or see the troubled, guilty expression that he wore. Bucky hadn't wanted him to see either.


	7. The Shadow with You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First off I am SO SORRY about the wait for this chapter. This summer has been a giant mess. I had a severe health issue crop up last month that required me bouncing in and out of the hospital for two weeks straight and we still don't have a conclusive answer as to what caused the problem and if I'm in serious danger. I'm also in the thick of moving which is a headache and a half. We're hitting the second big arc of this fic and I'm bringing in the rest of the Hydra Cleanup Crew so I hope this chapter is worth the wait! I'm sorry its a bit short, but I'm afraid the next few chapters will be that way with my schedule so messed up and my time divided between this and my other fics.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going to introduce hints to the Red Room and Natasha and co are back in action! I'm not too fond of the MCU's erasing of Bucky and Nat's Red Room history so I'm going to retcon that little mistake. Also, everyone's favorite archer is joining the fray and is here to stay. Also, most of this chapter was written while listening to Starset's debut album; everyone should listen to them ok.

The passing of days no longer registered, the only timestamps he recalled being changes in the Captain's condition. Some days he was awake when he was bidden time to spend in the cell, most times he was unconscious or in a restorative sleep as the serum tried to patch his body back together. The tainted, imperfect serum that flowed in his own veins was doing much the same, skin and bones mending beneath his clothing. It burned with a throbbing sort of heat and sometimes hours passed as he passively observed the healing, watching his own flesh knitting back together until only scars remained.

His body was healthier, the Asset noticed dimly, his new handlers eager to get him back to working conditions as soon as possible. The constant IV drips, the strange injections, the foodstuffs he was prodded to eat, they'd all filled him out so he didn't look quite so emaciated. He halfheartedly guessed that the serum had busied itself rebuilding his muscles with the amble nutrients he was getting as much as it was healing his wounds.

With his shoulder healing up, the white-coated techs had taken to repairing the extensive damage to his prosthetic. It now moved fluidly, easily, the burn that gnashed its teeth into his artificial nerves now abated and calmed. The plates had been smoothed and repaired, the blood and grime cleaned away, although the red star he had tried to scratch off with his own fingernails and anything within reach those first few weeks remained marred and damaged. The techs didn't try to reapply it; now that he was no longer tied to the Red Room and the Soviets, they had no need to flaunt their emblem.

He knew it was only a matter of time before they'd try to deploy him, to test his programing, but he knew it was mostly due to their eagerness to try and patch the damage that had been caused by the exposing of SHIELD as HYDRA. Pierce was dead, but the saying still held true; cut off one head, two more will take its place. Lukin was not the new leader, but he had fallen in as his new handler, and that bit of his programming was still sound enough to prevent him from refusing orders from the man.

Today, however, he'd been granted time with the Captain after preforming well in training. He knew that Lukin wanted to wipe him, to rebuild the programming and perhaps even try the same with the healing Captain, but he knew that the man couldn't. This facility lacked the proper equipment to carry out that procedure safely, or to rewrite and build the programming back into his mind. It was likely why they were even letting him see the other man. It was a way to keep him under control, giving him time with him like a dog being trained and rewarded with scraps. He ought to have been offended but honestly he didn't care; any time with Steve was worth whatever hell they put him through.

His earlier thoughts were all pushed aside as soon as he entered the room they were keeping Steve in. The soldiers always left them alone, Lukin convinced in his control over the Asset, and he preferred it this way. He knew he was always under surveillance, but the illusion of peace he had with the Captain was enough. Despite his few hours of reprieve here he never allowed his guard to lower, never spoke out of turn or gave any indication that the programming had slipped. He couldn't allow that knowledge to fall into Lukin's hands. He could find some way to wipe him clean and order him to kill the man he'd fought so hard to defend. The thought alone made his breathing falter.

"… Bucky?" blinking, his focus was pulled back to the present, to the Captain laid out on the cot. The Asset straightened himself, shoved down all his disjointed thoughts, padded over to the bedside to look down at him. He might have the perfected serum but he had been wounded horrifically; he was still all but bedridden with the injuries he'd sustained. He was half convinced the only reason he survived at all was because the Captain was just too damn stubborn to die. Dim memories of back alley fights, bright blond hair matted with blood and halfhearted smiles mired by bruising and dirt flitted across his mind for a brief moment.

The Asset didn't reply with words, merely humming in response as he sat down in the empty chair next to the cot. Some distant part of him was glad to see that Steve was awake and aware, as the last few visits he'd been groggy and barely able to speak, mumbling in a drug and pain-induced haze about things the Soldier didn't remember. It was stressful, but he would rather spend his time here, questioned over things he didn't understand or know, than be primed and molded to fall back into HYDRA's command.

"… you're in gear." Steve's voice was quiet, but he could still hear the apprehension and resignation in his tone. It bothered the Asset greatly. Lukin had hinted at possibly sending him out on some sort of simple assignment so he'd dressed himself in his heavy Kevlar vest and armor, hiding his healing wounds and returning build. The less Steve knew about how long he'd been trapped here the better. The last thing he needed was him hatching some idiotic scheme to escape that would get him killed.

"… d'you get your orders?" the words came out of his mouth slurred and soft, his mind obviously still a bit hazed from whatever drugs they had to have pumped him full of to keep him manageable. It set the Soldier's teeth on edge, the thought of them doing something like that to Steve, but he couldn't protest or else run the risk of being separated fully. The statement did, however, fire some distant, disjointed memory. He could almost smell the musty air of some damp alleyway, blood in the mouth of his friend as he spoke and looked at him in a strange mix of admiration and sadness. It made his heart ache in a way he wasn't familiar with, even without any further context to bolster it.

"… yeah, Steve." His voice was still rough with disuse, awkward and stiff and lacking in the emotion Steve held when he talked. The last time he'd been here the other man had panicked, remembering their capture, tried to fight his way free of the web of IV line that held him. At least this way, with him lost in his own sleepy awareness, he was easy to convince all was well although every lie he told tasted bitter on his tongue.

"B'careful, Buck." Steve mumbled a bit when the Asset stood and began to pick at his wound wrappings, drawing his eyes from his work to meet his. They were hazy from pain and sleep, greyed and sick looking in a way that made the Soldier's stomach knot up. He swallowed thickly and focused on checking all of Steve's wounds, not trusting any of the HYDRA medics or their work. Most of his wounds had closed, the deepest pink with new-grown scar tissue and the lesser wounds already silvered and faded into his skin.

"I will." The response was automatic, not looking away from his task now. He was replacing the packing in Steve's side, where the sniper round had ripped his chest cavity open. Even the serum was having trouble with the wound, and if it hadn't been for that (and his damn fool stubbornness) he surely would have bled out right there in the street.

Steve made a noise halfway between a whimper and groan when he started to pull the bloodied, coagulated mess of packing out of the wound, obviously feeling it even through the fog of painkillers. He squirmed enough to make his task difficult, but at the same time it lifted his spirits somewhat. His strength was coming back, slowly, but it was a good sign. His body was starting to heal enough for his system to begin filtering the medicines in his body more efficiently; a hazy memory bubbled up of Steve complaining about Morita's morphine shot not taking the edge off a bullet wound he'd gotten in the calf. This had to be a good sign. It just had to be.

The wound still looked horrific, and he knew he couldn't chance an escape with Steve in this state. The ragged tear was having trouble healing over due to just how much tissue loss and damage he'd sustained, despite the serum flowing in his veins. Even with Steve still moving around he was able to place more sterile packing into the wound and wrap it tight with gauze and medical tape, after treating it with a potent antibacterial wash that he made sure to carry on his person at all times. That hadn't been fun. Steve had gasped hoarsely and it'd hurt him to hear, but it needed to be done. He still didn't trust these HYDRA doctors to treat the wounds correctly, even though he had little formal medical training himself. It didn't matter in his mind; his body and muscle memory knew Steve and how to treat him better than anyone else and like hell he was going to just sit passively by and let someone who didn't know the first thing about Steve Rogers try to patch his wounds.

With his work finished and Lukin no doubt waiting on him, the Soldier knew he had to cut his visit short. The man had mentioned something about a cleanup mission, to take care of some SHIELD holdouts that had grouped up near where he and Steve had been picked up. It would be a quick and clean mission. They'd likely pair him with the surviving members of the Strike unit to keep him under observation, but he could easily use their fear of him to make them keep their distance. He had a feeling these 'SHIELD holdouts' might be whoever Steve had alerted the night they were captured. If that was the case this mission was going to go very poorly.

"M'leaving, don't get into any trouble while I'm gone." The Soldier mumbled a bit, not wanting to leave but knowing he couldn't stay. He gently smoothed down Steve's unruly hair with his right hand, _always the right_ , something he felt like he'd done countless times a hundred lifetimes ago. When he was around the other man it felt like he went on autopilot, doing things he had no clear conscious memory of ever knowing how to do, yet with the ease and familiarity as if he'd been doing them all his life. He knew how to calm him down, how he liked his pillows just so, how he had an awful habit of kicking the blankets off in his sleep, things he had no business knowing yet he _did_.

"No promises, Buck." Steve breathed out heavily, eyes already half-lidded with drowsy exhaustion but with a crooked grin on his face. The Soldier felt a near overwhelming urge to roll his eyes and swat his shoulder but he held back, knowing he was still badly wounded and not wanting any sign of playfulness to be seen by the cameras. He merely brushed a few dirty blond strands of hair out of Steve's face instead, hiding the action by pretending to hold his palm there to check his temperature. It was a poor ruse, with his fingers lingering a moment too long, body too loose with the feeling of safety, but he didn't think it would be caught.

This mission had him nervous. It sat low in his stomach like a weight of molten lead, burning and heavy and disorienting. It felt familiar in some distant way; he remembered feeling it before, while sitting in the snow at the edge of some high cliff, the snow kept off him with a shield held above his head by the man he was leaning heavily against for warmth. The memory was pushed down as he closed the door behind him, lock clicking softly at his back before he allowed himself to be pushed by the decayed programming to report to the command center. The sooner he completed his assignment the sooner he could return to Steve's side, and that was the only thought that kept his body in motion.

* * *

"Have you heard anything back from Jarvis, Stark? We've got to narrow down our search parameters."

The past few weeks had been complete and utter hell. Without SHIELD, running a rescue mission for one Steven Grant Rogers and one possibly-hostile Winter Soldier had been, to put it mildly, completely fucking exhausting. But, this was hardly enough to make Natasha crack. She'd done more with less resources and less time, and this time she had friends, _family_ , to help her. She poured herself another mug of coffee, glancing over to Stark tapping away at one of his fancy tablets and to Wilson and his makeshift workstation on the floor with his wingpack.

Sam, although she had known him the least amount of time, had slotted himself into the ragtag group as easily as clockwork, as if he'd been crafted to be a part of their unit. For the first week he'd housed both herself and Barton, who'd come as soon as Natasha had filled him in on the situation. It was reassuring having her partner in crime back at her side. Stark, for all his crassness and bluster, had dropped everything when she informed him of Steve's capture. As difficult as he was to work with some days, he really could be an invaluable ally as long as he kept himself occupied.

"Jarvis is going as fast as he can but there's a lot of data to go through," Tony's voice was heavy with lost sleep, as if the dark patches under his eyes and the hot coffee mug held tight in his hand weren't enough of a giveaway, "HYDRA's hiding themselves pretty well, or what's left of it anyway. They're probably disguising their shipments and covering their tracks more than usual. I doubt they'd take them out of the city yet, it'd draw too much attention, but, it _is_ HYDRA so who knows."

Tony must have repeated that a hundred times in a hundred different ways, and she knew that the tension was getting to them all, but it didn't make her any less anxious. They'd moved into Steve's apartment and the empty next door apartment after contacting Sharon, who provided her keys to the locks which had yet to be changed. She was doing what she could to aid in the search, but with her new job in the FBI and Natasha still in hot political water, she didn't want to add any fuel to that fire with her presence. If word got lose in the government that Captain America had been captured while housing the Winter Soldier, well, the repercussions were something none of them wanted to deal with.

"I'm going up to check the perimeter with Clint. Let me know if you find anything, and while Jarvis works maybe you could give Sam a hand." Sitting idle and waiting just wasn't in her nature. Sam was working on his damaged wingpack, which Tony had started to repair but had to drop to prep Jarvis for the scan of the city's information apparatus. They'd need Sam's help once the AI located whatever HYDRA hellhole Steve and the Winter Soldier had been taken to. Even though Steve seemed to trust him, there was still a wary part of her that couldn't dismiss the possibility that maybe the Winter Soldier had lead Steve into a trap, that he'd been a Trojan horse or some form of bait to lure him into HYDRA's clutches. It was a grim and farfetched possibility, but one that was all too real.

The cool air outside once she reached the roof was a welcome source of sobriety, washing away her muddled thoughts and letting her release her own tensions with a soft exhale. The last week had damn near run her ragged. To have something like this happen so soon after the fall of SHIELD, before she'd had a chance to really recover, was just not something she had ever expected to happen. She'd thought she would have had a bit more time before she'd have to pay her debt back to Steve for saving her life.

"Lower levels secure, how're things up here?" she sat down heavily near the archer, just in case he had his hearing aids turned down. He was perched on the corner of the building, goggled eyes on the building entrance and the surrounding streets. His bow was held in loose fingers, eyes never stopping their scan of the streets when he replied.

"Well, there's been an awful lot of owls around but no, haven't seen any HYDRA agents or anything unusual." Clint replied, voice a bit hoarse from not having spoken in several hours. Natasha roughly shoved her half-empty coffee mug into his side, nudging him until he sighed loudly and took it with his free hand.

"You've been on watch for hours, take a few minutes." She knew he was as tense and eager to find the Captain, but with nothing to do but stand watch it had to be bothering him a good deal. "Stark has Jarvis checking shipping records and anything else we can think of to try and narrow down a few spots. We don't think they're out of the city. Sam's getting his wings ready and if we have some locales by the end of the night we can move out as early as the morning."

"Good." Clint mumbled through a mouthful of coffee, having nearly chugged the whole cup while Natasha had been talking. "I've got Soviet cooties now but thanks for the coffee, 'Tasha." With an exasperated sigh Natasha punched his side, which made him jump and the coffee mug to slip out of his hand and down to the street below with a muffled shattering of ceramic. "Aw, mug no."

Natasha laughed, a true laugh, the kind that ended with her snorting into her sleeve. Maybe it was the tension of the night but it felt good to just laugh, and she heard Clint huff out a laugh as well. The last few days have weighed on her so much that it was nice to let off a little of the steam. She turned to make a witty comment but Clint frantically signed " _quiet_ " at her, eyes locked down where the mug had fallen. She was up and looking over the ledge of the building in an instant, keeping low so she wouldn't be seen.

She heard him notch an arrow and draw, his breathing evening out the way it did when he aimed. She spotted in the street below within a few seconds; a shadow out of place, a brief flash of reflected light off of metal. Natasha didn't hesitate to stop the archer, hand over his as he prepared to let the arrow fly, hissing out a breath between her teeth as she struggled to choose what to do. Downing him was likely the wisest option, but, if he was here, there was a chance Steve was too.

"Don't," she knew that Clint wouldn't, but speaking her thoughts couldn't hurt any, "This isn't right. If he was going to try and pick us off he would have while we were distracted. Something's going on." Clint kept his bow at half-pull, and she didn't blame him; she was cautious and untrusting herself, but as she watched the Winter Soldier looked right at them yet didn't duck behind cover. He just looked _right at them_.

"Tasha he could have agents all around the building we can't just sit here," he whispered harshly, pulling the bow to full-draw when the Soldier advanced until he was standing just a couple yards from the building. He was masked but lacked the goggles, dressed full in HYDRA gear with a rifle slung at his back, but hands empty.

"This isn't right, Clint." As if on cue, the Winter Soldier raised his hands, empty palms towards them. _A show of submission_. Natasha bit her lip, not knowing what was going on in the man's head but knowing that this wasn't one of HYDRA's normal tactics. Either this was the man that had grown up with Steve or a twisted HYDRA trap, or something in-between. "… I'm going down there. Cover me."

"Natasha you can't be—" she didn't give him the chance to try and talk her out of it, jumping onto the fire escape two floors down. It rattled so loud in the otherwise silent alleyway that she was sure HYDRA agents would be all over her, but seconds ticked by and there wasn't any movement, not even from the assassin in the street below. She was far from unarmed, with her Widow Bite discs in her pockets, a holstered pistol and a half dozen other weapons, but she would never underestimate the Winter Soldier.

Being on the ground, mere feet away from the man that had shot her just a few months ago, is… tense, to say the least. Her shoulder aches. He looks different now in a way she can't really place; he's thinner than he was in her memories, eyes dark with lost sleep and weary in a way she never thought was possible from so menacing a man. He looked ragged and downtrodden and every bit as awful as Steve had described. Beneath the layers of caution and defensiveness, she admitted she felt a twinge of, pity was too strong a word but something like it, for her former mentor.

"What do you want, James." The words came out more bitter than she had intended, but then again maybe it was better to put up that façade. For all she knew he remembered nothing of their past; even she didn't remember all of it. Most of what remained in her mind of the Red Room were broken memories; being taught how to break a man's neck with one motion by the same hands that would then braid her hair and clean her wounds with all the loving gentleness and words of caution of an older brother. The man standing before her wasn't the same as the one who taught her how to be an assassin, but then again, she wasn't the same little girl.

"Маленький паук." His voice was muffled under the muzzle-mask but that didn't diminish their effect. _Little Spider_. Natasha hadn't heard her old nickname in what felt like lifetimes. It told her that he remembered at least fragments of their past, much like her. "… I need your help." That definitely wasn't what she expected to hear him say next.

"My help?" Natasha repeated the statement softly, "… Steve. How can I help?" she watched his eyes light up the dimmest bit, the same sort of spark she remembered fondly after a particularly good showing during the daily trainings in the Red Room. James slowly lowered his right hand, pulling something small and flat from his pocket. An arrow cut the tense air between them, embedding itself into the pavement a few inches from the man's foot; a clear, grim warning not to test his luck. It gave the Soldier pause before he completed his action, a small, scuffed moleskin sketchbook clutched in his hand.

"They have him." James's voice was rough and so tired, the book gently placed in her hands with his fingers lingering on her own for the briefest moment, "They think I'm on their leash still, Natalia. Steve is hurt, I can't get him out on my own." His tone was almost pleading and it painfully twisted something up inside of her, "They sent me here to kill you all with the Strike team, you're not safe here any longer." Even without it being said, she knew that he had killed his own team to prevent them from hurting them.

"Where did they take him? Where are you based?" she got no clear answer, the Soldier merely tilting his head towards the thin sketchpad in her hands. When she opened the cover she realized there was a roughly drawn map, made of taken streets and turns that he must have taken to reach the building. It could lead them right to them.

"Natalia, listen to me," his voice was suddenly soft, shot through with remorse, "they're trying to get me under control again. If they manage to, I need you to put me down. Steve won't be able to, and you're the only person I can trust to do it right. They might not even need to do it, I might try and hurt him if I'm not in my right mind. Please, I need you to promise." Without even seeing his reaction she knew her façade fell for the briefest of moments, blindsided by the request. She'd expected him to be hostile, to be defiant at the least, but not _this_.

She couldn't form the words but nodded, setting her jaw and straightening her back. The look of relief that filled his eyes was almost as heartbreaking as the whole damn situation. He started to turn but she stopped him, withdrawing one of her Widow Bite discs from her pocket, slipping it into his palm, curling his calloused fingers around it with her own hands. Seconds ticked by before he broke eye contact with her, looking down to his hand that she still held and then to the arrow by his boot.

"… thank you, сестра." She almost missed it, that softly mumbled bit of Russian that solidified in her mind that this was really James talking, and not the Winter Soldier. _Sister_. She never thought she would ever hear that from him again. Natasha gave his hand a gentle squeeze before she backed away, the Soldier doing the same, storing the thin metal disc she had given him into one of his pockets.

"Be careful, James." Natasha spoke softly, "…брат." She watched him stiffen at the word, scanning her eyes for a long moment before he turned his head, breath exhaled loudly through the mask. She allowed her gaze to return to the roof, where Clint was still perched watchfully, another arrow at the ready. When she turned back to the Winter Soldier he was gone, just like the ghost he was. Her grip on the sketchbook tightened as resolve settled in. As it stood, HYDRA was holding two brothers from her, and they would soon come to regret that action.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nat and Bucky aren't actually brother and sister by blood, but by bond, just in case that didn't portray right. Thank you for reading!


	8. Cutting the Strings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Haha... so I broke my foot last month and that threw a huge wrench into things. I'm so sorry for the long delay in posting this! A lot happens in this chapter and this is still a lot to come so I hope you can forgive the long wait!

His mind had always been too loud. Too loud, too busy, too full of things he had no context for. He could see them in bright flashes of vivid experience; the smell of a Brooklyn alley after a midnight rain, the feel of a stray cat's fur under his palm as it arched into his touch, the sound of a train's wheels far too close, he could remember small bits in crisp clarity but the whole picture was broken. He held the shattered pieces of a great mosaic with no blueprint, no frame of reference; the grand work it once was lost, leaving him with only a hundred million broken fragments and no way to tell how they fit together.

At least, it had been that way for the decades under HYDRA's command. He'd been out of cryo so long, his mind let go to mend without the wipes and supplied with small threads to stitch the patchwork of memories together, that now he was slowly piecing that mosaic of his former life back together. His memories were less flashes of disjointed fragments and now short contingencies; instead of just an isolated sound of pencils scratching at paper he now had a tentative picture of a skinny boy hunched dutifully over a thin sketchpad as he drew, or how a Russian lullaby now reminded him of a dozen young faces in a dim military compound.

With the tentative return of his memories came the emotions attached to them. He remembered the fluttery lightness in his stomach when he laughed loud and long around a campfire with Steve and soldiers just on this edge of familiarity, or how the fear had felt like tendrils of ice snaking up his spine when he heard a door slam shut over the rattling of train wheels. He remembered what fondness felt like, how it had bloomed with a fragile warmth behind his ribs for the first time in decades when he heard the first few unsure English words leave Natalia's mouth, how she'd smiled like the sun after she held her first conversation in it with him. He remembered how it felt to have the emotions, but what he lacked entirely was how it felt to _receive_ them, to give them freely and openly.

The strings that HYDRA had cut and mangled were slowly reconnecting, threading through the holes in the decaying programming and forming stronger bonds with each day. He hid it, he hid it deep and he hid it well. If Lukin knew he would be isolated, probably even forcibly wiped with what little equipment the base had even if it had a high chance of killing him. He knew how Lukin operated, his worth was only measured by his effectiveness in the field, and he knew as soon as that was permanently diminished he was obsolete. Just another loose end to be cleaned up, a broken machine to be discarded, a toothless wolf to be tied down and shot.

A week had passed since his meeting with Natalia, since he'd given her every bit of information he could to help them find Steve. He could feel the programming responding to his HYDRA handlers, feel himself falling easier and easier into old ways and habits, found it harder to recall the broken shards of his memories. It scared him, it honestly scared him. What if tomorrow he woke up and all of the progress he had made was undone? What if tomorrow he looked at Steve and didn't see him, and saw only a target or mission or body to be disposed of? If he lost Steve, if he lost him and Natalia, then he knew there'd be no saving him from HYDRA; they were the only ones who stood even the slightest chance of picking up his shattered pieces. This act of putting faith and trust in others was so foreign to him it was almost terrifying but he knew he couldn't do this on his own.

The soft sound of exhaled breath brought him back to reality, eyes cutting down to where Steve was resting his head on his thigh. The wound to his right side had healed enough for him to move around somewhat, although his definition of moving was rather singular. Steve had rolled onto his left side, using the Soldier's lap as a pillow, the thin white blanket he was wrapped in streaked with rust red from the most recent change of bandages. The Asset had deemed him well enough to chance providing him with a shirt, bright SHIELD logo across the chest of it, the sight of which made him feel sick. Steve was curled up somewhat, back mostly to the Asset, trying to shrink into himself but twisting himself up in the blanket and his own limbs in the process. _Wide open to attack_. The thought stung in his mind, eyes narrowing a fraction behind the thick protective goggles, and was dispelled quickly. Steve Rogers was not a target, threat or mark to him, but his programming deemed otherwise.

Even with the serum Steve's wounds were taking too long to heal for the Asset to be comfortable. The horrific gunshot to his side had only just closed up, a stark red swath of raw muscle stretched taunt over mending bones. The wound to his collarbone had healed much quicker, now a silvery patch of scarred skin that was fading with every passing day. His breathing had evened out to a wheezy constant, no longer sputtering and fluid-filled. It was a small comfort to the Asset.

The HYDRA doctors kept him sedated heavily most days now, preventing him from attempting to fight back or flee. The Asset knew the drugs well enough, as they had been used on him in the past when he woke up from cryo. It had kept him docile and pliant and it made him sick to see Steve reduced to the same state. He was burning through the dosage much quicker than he ever had, sometimes snapping to awareness with a feral sort of desperation to escape. Lukin made an awful point to make him be the one to administer the syrette, make him stand and watch as Steve collapsed and wheezed and tried to fight the drug, always to fail. Lukin couldn't wipe him, but he was trying his damnedest to break him through other means.

He'd been given less and less time with the Captain, forced into training exercise after training exercise, with little rest in between. The goggles hid how cloudy from exhaustion his eyes had gotten, how dark the patches under them had become, rendering him less and less able to fight back against orders. He wanted to gnash his teeth and lash out at every turn but he didn't have near the strength to keep doing so. He was so tired. He was never going to stop fighting but the programming was much stronger in his depleted state, the feeling of it guiding his movements almost second nature after decades under its control.

Stress sat heavy on the Soldier's shoulders, weighing him down and filling him with dread. His right hand was gently carding through Steve's hair, curling through golden strands that had grown during their captivity. He had orders from Lukin himself, an ultimate test for his programming, and he could feel it straining in his mind, the cogs and gears of HYDRA's control creaking and screeching in protest against his unwillingness to comply. He'd known this order was coming since his capture, known since they let Steve recover, known since they let him visit him as a reward.

The possibility of it had eaten at his mind since his first agreement to comply with Lukin's wishes, but now that the command had been given the reality of it all had crashed down on him. It was punishment, he knew it, punishment for not killing Natalia and the small group she had gathered, for killing his own team to protect them. Lukin wanted him to know that he wasn't to make decisions and couldn't think for himself, and Lukin's sick sense of humor had been summed up in his simple order. He wanted balance; since he couldn't kill Natalia and her group, he had to take another's life.

He held a knife in his metal hand.

_"Kill the Captain, Soldier."_

Even hours later the words still rang in his ears, a roar that threatened to drown out his own thoughts. He couldn't reject a direct command from a handler such as Lukin, yet he'd managed to hold out this long, kept his blade from marring the unblemished skin of the blond's neck. He could feel the press of it bearing down on his mind, burning behind his temples and tugging at his limbs, but he fought it. He gritted his teeth under the muzzle-mask and hissed out his breath, trying to will himself to throw the knife away from them but his arm wouldn't respond. He couldn't disarm himself but he found he could keep himself from moving to attack; he was at a grim stalemate with the programming.

_"Slit his throat, Soldier. I want you to watch him die."_

A strangled sort of noise choked in the Asset's throat, swallowed down thickly as he struggled to keep from showing his distress outwardly. He didn't even realize his hands were shaking until Steve made a confused sound, tilting his head to look up at him with one medicine-fogged eye in silent question. It just made the Soldier's hands tremble more. He'd done everything he could to try and protect the few people he knew with certainty and it was being warped into Steve's own death; everything he'd done was going to kill the man he'd tried so hard to protect.

"… Bucky?"

The Asset's whole body shuddered at the other's voice, shaking so much he could hardly sit. He pulled his hand away and watched the other's face, thankful for the first time in decades for the mask that covered his expression. Steve couldn't see the pained look on his face, see how panicked and wild his eyes were through the goggles. Lukin's agents had locked him in here and he could see the shadows of them through the small square window on the door; he knew that they would keep him in here until he completed his mission. He'd lasted this long, he just had to keep telling himself he just had to hang on a little longer.

He had to look away. He couldn't look at Steve without the programming screaming to lunge, to hold him down and slash the blade across his open throat. The inner mechanisms of his metal arm whirled and purred, plates calibrating and lying flat and repeating, unfeeling fingers tight around the handle of the knife that he could hear cracks forming on the resin grip. He felt like some sort of predator, a monster; Steve had done nothing but try to protect and aid him and when he needed him to return the favor here he was, holding the knife that would kill him.

Muffled voices from the HYDRA agents outside, combined with their restlessly shifting shadows through the window, set off alarms in the Asset's mind. Something was going on. It was likely Lukin coming to inspect his progress and the thought of it was enough to worsen his shaking. He was being pulled in a dozen different directions; Lukin's words tugged at him to attack, his own mind screamed at him to get Steve out of this hellhole and protect him, while the programming whispered encouragements to complete his mission and be rewarded with the quiet sleep of cryo.

The weight in his lap vanished and he didn't dare look to see; he could hear Steve straining to sit up, breath wheezing out of his still-healing lungs from the effort. The programming lurched at the opportunity like a starving animal presented with a meal, teeth bared and desperate for blood. It'd be so easy to just turn and plunge the knife into his back; the blade was long enough to reach his heart through his ribs if he aimed right, he'd bleed out if it didn't outright kill him—

"Buck."

His grip on the knife tightened, servos in his arm whirring into readiness. If he completed his mission Lukin would put him in cryo, would stop all the noise of the broken memories in his head and let him _rest_ ; he was so tired, he'd run and fought for so long that even the horrors of his captivity seemed like a sweet relief from the pain of remembering. The fragments of his memories had always just been background noise before, but now with time and healing they were loud, intrusive, overwhelming and smothering. He couldn't handle it on his own.

"Buck, something's going on, we need to get out of here—"

He was so far lost in his own mind, moving without knowing, drowning inside his own thoughts and broken memories. There was only so long one could fight before it all collapsed, until one gives in under the pressure. With his memories a jumbled heap, struggling to stitch together, the pain of it all was overpowering. He felt trapped inside a cage like a wild animal, desperate to get out and escape from all the noise.

The soft touch of warm fingers on his right arm triggered an immediate response, twisting and clamping his hand onto a still-healing shoulder, knife edge pressed to soft skin. He was instantly still, muscles wound tight like a spring, blade biting into his throat just enough to draw a single trickle of blood. _Steve, this is Steve,_ _ **stop**_. He was horrified, wanting nothing more than to bolt out the door before he could do something to hurt him more, but he _couldn't move_. He could only watch as Steve swallowed, eyes staring into his featureless goggles, confused and frightened but, God, still so bright.

"Bucky, put it down… _please_ …"

A sound that could have been a whimper escaped him, stomach turning in disgusted horror at himself. _Yet he still couldn't move the weapon away_. He couldn't just ignore his mission but he could try and fight it, try to delay it, give Steve enough time to try and get away but unless he got a new command he had to complete it. It was the worst part of the programming.

"You don't have to listen to them anymore, Buck."

Steve sounded more lucid than he had in weeks, even with his eyes still fogged from medication and pain. He knew Steve, he'd made the connection between him and the boy with the sparrow-thin bones and bloodied knuckles from his memories, but seventy years of forced obedience and programming and control were impossible to just shrug off. Steve must have sensed it, but then again even the broken fragments of his memories told him that he had always been able to read him like a book.

He didn't show an ounce of fear as he slowly raised his hand, hovering it over his metal wrist, never breaking eye contact. He reasoned he wanted him to make sure he saw what he was doing. He remained tense and stiff, ready to slash the blade the inch it'd take to kill the man, but he waited. Steve seemed to take it as permission, lightly laying his hand over his own metal one, trying to gently push it away from his throat. He resisted at first, artificial muscles clicking and flexing before he slowly relaxed, letting his arm be guided away and down.

"You're okay, Bucky," he started, keeping his voice low and even, not even blinking at the impossibly loud sound of the knife clattering to the floor as it slipped from the Asset's grip, "you're my friend, you don't have to make it on your own."

_Thank you Buck, but I can make it on my own._

_The thing is, you don't have to._

Something about those string of words sparked something, a bright image flashing in his mind. He remembered Steve, so much smaller with red-ringed eyes. He remembered his hand gripping his shoulder tightly; he realized dimly that he was doing much the same now, a twisted sort of parody of a gesture that no doubt had once been based in comfort. Steve lifted his free hand, the other still cradling the metal wrist that a moment ago had been poised to slit his throat, reaching slowly towards his face. The memory was so vivid he didn't even react until he felt his goggles being gently tugged away, dropping discarded into his lap.

The Asset tried to suck in a breath through the muzzle mask but his lungs hitched as his whole body began to shake, arms dropping into his lap, limp. He had no idea what was happening. The programming had faltered, leaving him unable to complete the mission; the conflict between his programming and the memories was just too much. Panic filled every bit of him, heart hammering against his ribs and stomach threatening to retch. He'd never felt like this in any of the memories he had and it terrified him. He couldn't get enough air and he felt entirely out of control of his own body, his breathing loud and ragged and desperate under the mask.

He felt Steve's hand on his left shoulder, thumb just barely tracing the ragged seam where metal met flesh, his eyes focused on his own as he spoke although he didn't hear a word he said. Normally he flinched or reacted violently to contact but he didn't this time, merely shrinking into himself in an attempt to hide from the storm that was his mind. It was oddly assuring, the feeling of his firm grip on his shoulder, although it didn't immediately register that he was touching his left arm. He couldn't touch him with his left arm, he couldn't, _he couldn't_. He was dimly aware of a loud noise outside the room, an electric sort of noise that sent the panic coiling in his belly shooting straight up his spine. He needed to get away. Electricity meant pain, meant the wipe that would steal Natalia and Steve and his fragile memories away again.

His legs felt boneless when he tried to jump up but he didn't make it any farther than that, Steve's grip on his shoulder turning strong as steel, pulling him back down. The Asset dimly heard him yelling at him; he heard _Bucky_ and he heard _its okay_ but everything in between was lost in the blur that was the panic swirling in his mind. The electric noise was right outside, it was _too close_. _Too close._

"S-Steve I—"

The door was blown off its hinges with a bolt of blue, slamming into the wall, and all thoughts screeched to a halt and screamed _attack_.

* * *

Steve flinched violently when the door exploded to his right, shards of hot metal bouncing off his side. The air was full of the acrid stench of charred metal and sharp electricity, a scent he knew like the back of his hand. Stark. Thank God, Natasha had gotten help and somehow found them. They just might get out of this mess after all. He had his visor flipped open and grinned when he saw him, motioning to the two of them broadly. He didn't have enough time to warn him about Bucky, to warn him about the sound the repulsors made, to warn him about _anything_.

"Tony, Tony turn off your Repulsors!" he shouted but by the time the words left his lips Bucky had already sprung, producing a knife from somewhere on his person and lunging at Tony like a bird of prey, blade like a talon aiming straight for the suit's Arc Reactor. Tony didn't even have enough time to flip down his visor before Bucky barreled into him, sending them both to the floor. Steve tried to jump up to pry Bucky off but the drugs were still in his system, making his limbs feel a hundred pounds heavier and the room spin with any sudden movement. It felt like when his blood sugar used to dip before the serum.

The screech of metal against metal was nearly ear-splitting, the knife glancing off an armored gauntlet when Tony threw his arms up to deflect the strike. Bucky jammed the blade into one of the seams, Tony actually letting out a yelp before he jerked his arm back, the knife catching and snapping from the torque. The useless hilt was discarded, fingers curling into a fist and slamming into the Arc Reactor, cracking the protective covering. Steve's heart skipped and he screamed at Bucky to stop but he watched as he raised his fist again, aiming to break the Reactor which would trap Tony in the powerless suit.

A brilliant flash of blue filled the room and Bucky was thrown off, the sleeve of his uniform disintegrating and exposing the metal underneath. The Repulsor blast had been drastically dialed back, only enough power behind it to knock him away, but it still nearly blew him into the far wall. He landed on his feet like some sort of cat and skidded back, tattered sleeve smoking and the plating of his arm mired with superficial electricity burns. His breathing was far too fast and he was still shaking, hardly able to stand on his own two feet.

"Bucky calm down!" Steve pulled himself free of the IV drips, using the wall to steady himself as he moved closer to Tony; he was hedging his bets on the fact that Bucky hopefully wouldn't attack with him so close to his target. "Tony is a friend, he's not going to hurt you!" he could only watch helplessly as Bucky tensed himself up again, coiling in on himself like a snake about to strike. "Bucky, don't! I promise he's not going to hurt you!" he placed himself between the two, holding his hands up submissively. Tony quickly did the same, powering down his Repulsors completely.

Bucky remained crouched and ready to lunge, another much larger blade in his right hand. His eyes darted between Steve and behind him to Tony as if he was trying to judge his distance; it made Steve's stomach drop. He edged forward slowly, closing the distance hesitantly even though he heard Tony's concerned hiss of _Steve be careful_ behind him.

"Buck, its okay I promise. Its fine, Tony's not going to hurt you or me." he assured, reaching out and slowly taking hold of his hand with the knife. Bucky didn't let go, keeping his eyes locked on Tony over Steve's shoulder as if daring him to try and take another step closer even though he was now shaking so badly he could barely keep his stance. His eyes were still unfocused and wild, nothing like they were the last few times he'd visited him in his cell.

"Cap I think he's having a panic attack," Tony said suddenly, visor flipping up, "try and get him calmed down so we can get you both out of here. Widow is coming down the hallway; I'm going to make sure our path out is clear but we need to leave before more HYDRA agents show up." Steve nodded back at him before turning his attention back to Bucky, hand still on the hilt of the knife to try and keep him from lunging around him at Tony.

"Buck, Buck I need you to look at me," Steve spoke sternly, Bucky's gaze snapping back to him in an instant, "please try and calm down. You're breathing too hard, just, try and focus on slowing it down." He'd talked Tony through his panic attacks in the last few months when something triggered them but Tony had never had a penchant to try and kill him during them.

The knife came loose from his grip a moment later, Steve quickly tossing it out of reach onto the abandoned cot. Bucky was shuddering so much he looked like he was about to shake apart, breath heaving in and out. He wanted to get the mask off of him but he didn't think it was a good idea with him still so flighty. He could easily end up hurting him or himself.

"James, теперь ты в безопасности."

He felt Bucky jolt to look over at the remains of the door where Natasha was now standing silently, the shield strapped to one arm. Steve would have spun around himself but he didn't dare make any sudden moves with Bucky in his state, knowing he was teetering on the edge of attacking him or attacking anyone who so much as came within three feet of him with a weapon.

"N-Natalia." Bucky's voice was painfully weak, hardly audible over his breathing. Steve heard her walk over, she deliberately making enough noise so not to startle him, reaching out to lay her hand on his arm gently. It seemed to ease his shaking a bit, having two grounding points, but they didn't have the time to get him completely calmed down. They still had to get out of this nightmarish place and get to safety.

"You're going to be fine, брат." She reassured him soothingly, her voice softer than he'd ever heard it before, "we're going to take you and Steve somewhere safe." Bucky seemed to calm a bit at her words, tentatively nodding in agreement as his tremors subsided. He still looked pale and nervous but he didn't seem to be on the verge of passing out anymore. "Steve, Stark has the hallway clear but we need to go now. More agents are inbound and we don't have the head of the base pinned down. Do you think he's good for extraction?" Steve turned to look at the Soldier at her words, and he mirrored the action.

"Do you think you can make it out of the building, Buck? We need to go." Steve asked and was relieved when he saw the slight nod he got in response.

"Good. Clint and Bruce are outside in a Quinjet. Let's get you both home."


End file.
